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The photo-induced peroxymonosulfate (photo-PMS) reaction is a promising route to eliminate antibiotics from waste water. To achieve excellent photo-PMS activity in Mg–Fe layered double hydroxides (LDHs) for tetracycline hydrochloride (TCH) degradation under simulative solar-light irradiation, Mg–Fe LDHs-loaded polyacrylonitrile (Mg–Fe/PAN) nanofibers were in-situ prepared via the hydrothermal route. For comparison to the photocatalysis and photo-PMS process, the Mg–Fe/PAN-assisted photo-PMS process exhibited a better elimination activity for TCH elimination. In addition, the photo-PMS activities of Mg–Fe/PAN composites were greatly affected by Mg–Fe LDHs content, TCH concentration, pH, and inorganic salts. Among these Mg–Fe/PAN composites, the optimal MgFe2/PAN with a Mg/Fe molar ratio of 1:2 and a nominal Mg–Fe LDHs content of 2.0 wt. % removed 81.31% TCH solution of 80 mg L−1 TCH within 120 min. This enhanced photo-PMS capacity of MgFe2/PAN was ascribed to the abundant active sites formed by functional groups and oxygen defects for efficient TCH species adsorption and photon capturing, and the tight interface between Mg–Fe LDHs nanoparticles and PAN nanofibers for the rapid separation and transfer of photoinduced e−/h+ pairs. SO4•− and •O2− radicals were vital for the MgFe2/PAN-assisted photo-PMS reaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cloud-induced atmospheric extinction and occlusion significantly affect the effectiveness and quality of telescope observations. Real-time cloud-cover distribution and long-term statistical data are essential for astronomical siting and telescope operations. Visual inspection is currently the primary approach for analyzing cloud distribution at ground-based astronomical sites. However, the main disadvantages of manual observation methods are human subjectivity, heavy workloads, and poor real-time performance. Therefore, a real-time automatic cloud image classification method is desperately needed. This paper presents a novel cloud identification method named the PSO+XGBoost model, which combines eXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost) with particle-swarm optimization (PSO). The entire cloud image is divided into 37 sub-regions to identify the distribution of the clouds more precisely. Nineteen features, including the sky background, star density, lighting conditions, and subregion grayscale values, are extracted. The experimental results have shown that the overall classification accuracy is 96.91%, and our model can outperform several state-of-the-art baseline methods. Our approach achieves high accuracy in comparison with the manual observation methods. Moreover, this method meets telescope real-time scheduling requirements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study aims to develop a robust sediment transport model focusing on the vertical two-dimensional water–sediment two-phase flow in which sediments are constantly interacting, hitting each other, gradually becoming smoother and smaller, and accumulating when velocities decrease. The grid-based models currently available can be cumbersome when dealing with phenomena that require replication of this water–sediment interface. Therefore, a two-dimensional water–sediment two-phase flow model based on Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) is established in the macroscopic scale to simulate a large amount of sediment accumulation and propagation typical of a landslide caused by a dam break. In this study, water and sediments are treated as two kinds of fluids with different densities and viscosities to accurately simulate the flow structure, the sediment transport, and the water–sediment interaction process. The interaction model developed treats the interface of the two phases within a unified framework. The model developed was then tested against three applications, and the results obtained confirmed its accuracy in correctly replicating the movement of the sediment phase. The preliminary results obtained can be helpful in providing further insights into the mixing of water and sediments and their propagation following a dam break and the consequent wave profile generated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To accurately understand soil environmental quality and improve the problem of the traditional method, which is that it has a single evaluation factor and cannot reflect the overall condition of the soil, a complex geological soil heavy metal evaluation modeling method based on the Nemerow index method is proposed. Index evaluation methods, ArcGIS technology, and a human health risk assessment were carried out to obtain the spatial distribution of heavy metals in the soil and the current status of pollution accumulation. The comprehensive pollution index (CPI) method, geo-accumulation index (GAI) method, and potential ecological hazard (PEH) index were adopted to analyze the pollution degree of soil heavy metals. On this basis, the Nemerow index method was used to establish a complex geological soil heavy metal evaluation model, and the standard Nemerow index was calculated to complete the evaluation of heavy metal pollution in complex geological soils. The research results showed that this method could make the evaluation factors obtain reasonable scores and obtain more reasonable soil evaluation results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To disclose the effect of crystal plane on the adsorption-photocatalytic activity of MnS, octahedral MnS was prepared via the hydrothermal route to enhance the adsorption and photocatalytic efficiencies of tetracycline hydrochloride (TCH) in visible light region. The optimal MnS treated at 433 K for 16 h could remove 94.83% TCH solution of 260 mg L−1 within 180 min, and its adsorption-photocatalytic efficiency declined to 89.68% after five cycles. Its excellent adsorption-photocatalytic activity and durability were ascribed to the sufficient vacant sites of octahedral structure for TCH adsorption and the feasible band-gap structure for visible-light response. In addition, the band gap structure (1.37 eV) of MnS with a conduction band value of −0.58 eV and a valence band value of 0.79 eV was favorable for the generation of O2−, while unsuitable for the formation of OH. Hence, octahedral MnS was a potential material for the removal of antibiotics from wastewater. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our study area is the upstream watershed of the Guanting and Miyun Reservoirs; together, these two reservoirs comprise the main drinking water source of Beijing, China. In order to prevent crop contamination and preserve the quality of the water and soil, it is important to investigate the spatial distribution and the sources of the heavy metals in farmland soils on the watershed scale. For this study, we collected 23,851 farmland surface soil samples. Based on our analysis of the concentrations of eight heavy metals in these samples, we found that the overall soil quality in our study area is excellent, but that the Cd, Cu, Zn, and Cr contamination risks are relatively high. Moreover, a percentage of samples exceeded the Cd (1.54%,), Cu (0.28%), Zn (0.25%), Cr (0.13%), Pb (0.09%), As (0.05%), Ni (0.04%), and Hg (0.02%) risk screening values for soil contamination in agricultural land. In addition to determining the spatial distribution characteristics of the heavy metal concentrations of the soil samples, we also conducted a factor analysis and an R cluster analysis (CA) whcih can gathered the similar variables to track the sources of the heavy metals. We found that the Cd, Pb, and Zn are likely sourced from a quartz syenite porphyry body and from coal-fired enterprises, while the Cr, Cu, and Ni contaminations are mainly caused by runoff from iron ore smelting. Additionally, agricultural production contributes to the local accumulation of Cu, and industrial (smelting) discharge is partially responsible for the As contamination. As a result of the atmospheric deposition of pollutants, areas with high Hg concentrations are generally centered on large- and medium-sized cities. Due to these high natural heavy metal background values, the existing and future heavy metal contamination in the watershed poses a serious ecological risk to both the soil and the surface water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Dujiangyan Irrigation System (DIS), located in the western portion of the Chengdu Plain at the transitional junction between the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau and Sichuan Basin, has been in operation for about 2300 years. The system automatically uses natural topographical and hydrological features and provides automatic water diversion, sediment drainage and intake flow discharge control, thus preventing disastrous events in the region in a 'natural' way. Using a numerical modeling approach, this study aims to investigate the reasons behind this natural behavior of the system and provide a better understanding of the complex mechanisms which have caused the sustainability of the DIS for over two millennia. For this purpose, a two-phase flow model based on the Shallow Water Equations (SWEs) is developed to simulate the fluid and sediment motions in the DIS. A coupled explicit-implicit technique based on the Finite Element Method is applied for the fluid flow and a Sediment Mass (SM) model in the framework of the Lagrangian particle method is proposed to simulate the sediment motion under different flow discharge conditions. The results show how different components of the DIS make full use of the hydrodynamic and topographical characteristics of the river to effectively discharge sediment and excess flood to the downstream and create an environmentally sustainable irrigation system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, N-doped carbon-coated ZnS with a sulfur-vacancy defect (ZnS@N-C) was performed for the visible-light-driven photodegradation of tetracycline hydrochloride (TCH). The obtained ZnS@N-C exhibited enhanced photocatalytic activity compared with ZnS for TCH removal. Among these ZnS@N-C composites, ZnS@N-C-3 with N-doped content of 3.01% (100 nm) presented the best visible-light photocatalytic activity and superior long-term photocatalytic stability after five cycle times for TCH removal in the visible light region. This may be ascribed to the interface between the N-doped carbon shell and ZnS with a sulfur-vacancy defect for efficient charge transfer and the restrained recombination of charge carriers. Electron spin resonance (ESR) results indicate that the ·O2‒ radical plays a crucial role in the enhanced photocatalytic activity of ZnS@N-C-3. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ag quantum dots (QDs) anchored on CeO2 nanosheets with a carbon coating (Ag/CeO2@C) (composites) were prepared via an in situ reduction approach for the photocatalytic degradation of Cr(VI) and tetracycline hydrochloride (TCH) in the visible-light region. The photocatalytic activity of Ag/CeO2@C was greatly affected by carbon content, Ag-doping content, Cr(VI) concentration, pH value, and inorganic ions. Enhanced photocatalytic activity was obtained by Ag/CeO2@C (compared to CeO2 and CeO2@C), of which 3-Ag/CeO2@C-2 with an Ag-doping content of 5.41% presented the best removal efficiency and the most superior stability after five cycles. ·O2− and ·OH radicals were crucial for the photocatalytic capacity of 3-Ag/CeO2@C-2. The combined effect of the surface plasma resonance (SPR) of Ag QDs, an electron trapper of carbon shells, and the redox activity of the Ce(III)/Ce(IV) coupling induced efficient charge transfer and separation, suppressing the recombination of electron–hole pairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CuInS2/Mg(OH)2 (CIS/Mg(OH)2) nanosheets have been prepared for the visible light activated photodegradation of tetracycline hydrochloride (TCH). The introduction of CuInS2 has proven to enhance the photocatalytic activity of Mg(OH)2 nanosheets. It's ascribed to the enhanced transfer and separation of charge carriers at the junction interface between CuInS2 and Mg(OH)2. The photocatalytic activity of obtained CIS/Mg(OH)2 is greatly affected by CuInS2 content, pH value, and inorganic ions. Among these samples, 2-CIS/Mg(OH)2 exhibits the excellent photocatalytic activity and durability for the visible light driven removal of TCH after five cycle times. Atomic force microscope (AFM) images indicate that the surface roughness of 2-CIS/Mg(OH)2 is intensively influenced in adsorption-photocatalysis process. The •O2− and •OH radicals are vital for the visible light driven photocatalytic activity of 2-CIS/Mg(OH)2 for TCH removal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]