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A total of 350 weanling pigs (DNA 400 × 200; initially, 5.67 ± 0.06 kg BW) were used in a 42-day study with 5 pigs per pen and 14 replicate pens per treatment. At weaning, pigs were allotted to pens in a completely randomized design and pens of pigs were randomly assigned to one of five dietary treatments: 1) negative control (CON ; standard nursery diet containing only 150 ppm Zn from trace mineral premix and no acidifier); 2) control diet with 3,000 ppm added zinc from ZnO included in phase 1 and 2,000 ppm added zinc from ZnO included in phase 2 (ZnO) ; 3) control diet with 0.70% formic acid (FA ; Amasil NA; BASF, Florham, NJ); 4) control diet with 0.18% glycerol monolaurate (GML ; Natural Biologics GML, Natural Biologics, Newfield, NY); and 5) control diet with a 1.0% blend of formic acid and glycerol monolaurate (FORMI ; FORMI 3G, ADDCON GmbH, Bitterfeld-Wolfen, Germany). Pigs were fed treatment diets from d 0 to d 28 and were then fed a common diet from d 28 to d 42. From days 0 to 7, pigs fed ZnO or FORMI had increased (P = 0.03) ADG compared to pigs fed CON, with no difference in feed intake (P > 0.05). Overall, pigs fed GML had reduced (P < 0.0001) ADG compared with those fed the CON, ZnO, or FORMI diets. Fecal DM was evaluated from days 7 to 28 and there was a treatment × day interaction (P = 0.04). Pigs fed GML had a lower fecal DM % on day 7, but a higher fecal DM % on days 14 and 21; however, no differences in fecal DM were observed on day 28. Fresh fecal samples were collected from the same randomly selected pig on days 0 and 14 (70 pigs total;14 pigs per treatment) for analysis of fecal microbial populations using 16S rDNA sequencing. Dietary treatment did not significantly impact fecal microbiota at the phyla level, but pigs fed ZnO had an increased relative abundance (P < 0.01) of the family Clostridiaceae. A blood sample was also collected from one pig per pen on days 0 and 14 for analysis of serum IgA, IgG, and TNF- α. There was no evidence that dietary treatment effected IgA, IgG, or TNF- α concentrations. The effect of sampling day was significant (P < 0.05), where circulating IgA and TNF- α was increased and IgG was decreased from days 0 to 14. In summary, there is potential for a blend of formic acid and GML to improve growth performance immediately post-weaning without negatively impacting fecal consistency. Formic acid and GML alone or in combination did not impact fecal microbial populations or serum immune parameters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Kupferstichkabinett (Museum of Prints and Drawings) of the Staatliche Museen zu Berlin (National Museums in Berlin), the collection of the drawings and prints of Karl Friedrich Schinkel (1781-1841) is stored in cabinets made of laminated chipboard panels. The works are enclosed in portfolios that sit inside the cabinets on shelves made of bonded beech wood. Oddy tests carried out on the various storage materials showed their high corrosive potential on lead. In particular, the two wood composite materials caused a corrosion rate that was even higher than that of 5% acetic acid or 5% formic acid. The analysis of the air composition inside the storage cabinets confirmed this showing a considerably high concentration of acetic acid (4.7 mg/m3 on average) and a slightly elevated concentration of formaldehyde. Filling the cabinet and measuring its air composition in several steps allowed the determination of the main emission sources which were the shelves for acetic acid, and the cabinet walls for acetic acid as well as for formaldehyde. Further research on the organic acid content in the beech wood shelves together with a literature review led to the conclusion that formic acid is also expected to be present in elevated concentrations inside the cabinet. However, it could not be detected in the air quality measurements for technical reasons. In a next step, the ability of various historical and modern papers with and without alkaline reserve to adsorb acetic acid and formic acid was tested. It was shown that all papers adsorbed acidic VOCs in a relatively short period of time, whereas afterwards the adsorption proceeded more slowly. It was further shown that the sorption capacity of alkaline papers on acetic acid and on formic acid was five times as high as of neutral or acidic papers. Finally, the effectiveness of various measures to reduce the emergence of volatile organic compounds in the objects' surroundings was tested. The removal of the beech wood shelves led to a significant decrease in the acetic acid concentration, while the addition of alkaline papers did not show any positive effect at all. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights • Acidic conditions play an important role in the degradation of tasimelteon. • Tasimelteon has a new degradation product in acidic stress conditions. • Fragmentation patterns are estimated to McLafferty rearrangement and α elimination. • Two fully validated methods are proposed for both LC–MS/MS and HPLC. • LCMS-IT-TOF promises to characterize the compounds thanks to its high resolution. Novel stability-indicating HPLC methods have been presented for the analysis of Tasimelteon (TSM) besides its main degradation products in bulk and pseudo tablet formulations in this study. For the LC-DAD method; quantitation of TSM and its separation with other degradation products were achieved on an Ascentis ExpressTM pentafluorophenylpropyl (F 5)-bonded fused-core silica particle column (2.7 μm particle size 100 × 4.6 mm, Supelco) using the mobile phase consisted of acetonitrile: acetate buffer (0.025 M, pH 4.5): water (40:10:50, v/v/v); the elution was performed at 0.8 mL min−1 flow rate, detecting the compounds at 281 nm. In addition to regular in- house validation studies, the developed method was tested on another UPLC instrument to assess its ruggedness for possible method transfer demands. For the LC–MS/MS method, analyte quantitation was achieved on a second-generation monolithic silica column (Chromolith™ High-Resolution RP-18e, 100 × 4.6 mm from Merck KGaA, Germany); the mobile phase was a mixture with 0.1 % (v/v) formic acid in water and 0.1 % (v/v) formic acid in acetonitrile (60: 40 (v/v), pH = 2.5). The instrumental and analytical performances of all three instrumental systems were compared with each other in terms of the working range, LOD, and LOQ. In addition to the above, a new degradation product was identified using LCMS-IT-TOF system. It can be concluded that among the similar ones in the literature, this study is the most comprehensive method optimization and validation study to date about TSM, in which a novel degradation product was also reported. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reports that a research team at the Leibniz Institute of Catalysis in Rostock, Germany has controlled the extraction of hydrogen from formic acid. It states that the group has successfully extracted the element without the need for high-temperature reforming, which is usually involved in other hydrogen-generation systems. Meanwhile, the process generates on-demand hydrogen from formic acid in the presence of an amine and a catalyst. In connection, the use of formic acid for hydrogen storage combines the advantages of hydrogen/oxygen fuel-cell technology.