Search

Rising stress, mental health issues, and suicide rates among farmers highlight the need to understand factors influencing their job satisfaction. Farming presents distinct challenges with its unique mix of positive and negative characteristics. This study utilized dual‐factor theory to investigate how various factors, such as economic dynamics, farm financial health, stewardship views, experience with extreme weather, and climate change concerns, influence farmers' job satisfaction and dissatisfaction. Data from a 2020 survey of Iowa farmers were analyzed using ordinal logistic regression. Financial health, stewardship motivations, and perceived adequacy of conservation practices emerged as significant predictors of both job satisfaction and dissatisfaction. Farmers' extreme weather events experiences were positively associated with job satisfaction, indicating successful coping enhances contentment. Conversely, climate change concern was negatively associated with job satisfaction. As a revenue protection strategy, faith in crop insurance was negatively related to job dissatisfaction. In summary, besides the anticipated positive impact of farm financial health, the findings show that job satisfaction in farming is linked to stewardship motivations and perceived adequacy of conservation practices on the farm. The results suggest an opening for policies and programs aligning financial and conservation goals, potentially enhancing long‐term farmer well‐being and sustainable agricultural practices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the process of preparing biodiesel using microreactors, cosolvents and homogeneous catalysts are generally used, which adds to the separation cost. Hence, this study explored the use of an opposite-side feed micro-fixed-bed reactor with an inner diameter of 2 mm to produce biodiesel by the transesterification of soybean oil and methanol without any cosolvent, in which a fixed solid base acted as catalyst and obstacles. A biodiesel yield of 99.4% was achieved when the methanol-to-oil molar ratio was 12, the temperature was 70 °C, and the residence time was 8.05 min. A mixing study was conducted for this microreactor through computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations. The results showed that the best mixing index could reach 0.94 within 25 mm (length). Then, the transesterification kinetics in this reactor were found to be consistent with the proposed pseudo-homogeneous secondary reaction model. With the kinetics data and mixed-model, the biodiesel yield could be predicted. The simulated results were consistent with the experimental data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Diversifying high-input, monocropped landscapes like the US Corn Belt would provide both economic and ecosystem service benefits to the agricultural landscape. Decision support systems (DSS) and digital agriculture could help farmers decide if diversification is suitable for their operation. However, adoption of DSS by farmers remains low, likely due to lack of farmer engagement before and during the DSS development process. This study aimed to better understand the tasks, tools, and people involved in implementing farmland diversification with the goal to inform design of agricultural DSS. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 farmers who had diversified their corn/soybean cropland with government-supported conservation programs (e.g., CRP, wetlands) and alternative crops (e.g., small grains, pasture) in the past four years. Interview data was transcribed and then analyzed using affinity diagramming. Results show farmers needed DSS to layer multiple sources of data and observations over several years to identify field productivity trends and drivers; spatial orientation of practices to fit management and field constraints; matching operation goals to alternative practices; financial planning and market exploration; and information on promising emerging practices like subsidized pollinator habitat. However, the interviews also highlighted structural barriers to diversification that DSS cannot or can only partially address. These included social pressures; market access; crop insurance policy; and quality of relationships with governmental agencies. Results indicate better DSS design can empower individual farmers to diversify cropland, but structural interventions will be needed to successfully diversify the agricultural landscape and support economic and ecosystem health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conversion of glycerol to aromatic hydrocarbons is of great significance from the perspective of reducing dependence on fossil resources and comprehensive utilization of industrial by-products. In this study, Holl-HZSM-5 catalysts with hollow structure was prepared and then modified by Zn, Sn and La by impregnation method for the aromatization of glycerol. The results showed that the hollow structure could broaden the internal space and specific surface area of the HZSM-5, thus prolonged the lifetime. Zn modified Holl-HZSM-5 (Zn-Holl-HZSM-5(IM)) present a preferable catalytic performance: under the conditions of 40 wt% glycerol/methanol solution, reaction temperature of 400 °C at 1 atm, mass space velocity of 0.82 h−1, the yield of BTX was 33.5%, and the catalytic lifetime was 8.5 h. In addition, the different preparation methods were investigated for Zn modified Holl-HZSM-5. It was found that Zn@Holl-HZSM-5 prepared by in-situ method had suitable acid strength, acid distribution and intergranular mesoporous, thus the conversion path of aromatization could be further coordinated, leading to a better catalytic efficiency and longer lifetime.Graphical Abstract: The conversion of glycerol to aromatic hydrocarbons is of great significance from the perspective of reducing dependence on fossil resources and comprehensive utilization of industrial by-products. In this study, Holl-HZSM-5 catalysts with hollow structure was prepared and then modified by Zn, Sn and La by impregnation method for the aromatization of glycerol. The results showed that the hollow structure could broaden the internal space and specific surface area of the HZSM-5, thus prolonged the lifetime. Zn modified Holl-HZSM-5 (Zn-Holl-HZSM-5(IM)) present a preferable catalytic performance: under the conditions of 40 wt% glycerol/methanol solution, reaction temperature of 400 °C at 1 atm, mass space velocity of 0.82 h−1, the yield of BTX was 33.5%, and the catalytic lifetime was 8.5 h. In addition, the different preparation methods were investigated for Zn modified Holl-HZSM-5. It was found that Zn@Holl-HZSM-5 prepared by in-situ method had suitable acid strength, acid distribution and intergranular mesoporous, thus the conversion path of aromatization could be further coordinated, leading to a better catalytic efficiency and longer lifetime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Mountains are an important kind of landform on the earth's surface. Due to harsh mountainous environment, such as steep slopes and cliffs, remote sensing has become an indispensable tool for surveying mountain areas instead of traditional ground surveys. However, the accuracy of current land cover products derived from remote sensing in mountain areas is still low. In this paper, we propose a three-level architecture for land cover classification in mountain areas. Topographic partitioning is first performed in order to partition a large area into several smaller zones, and then, multiresolution segmentation is implemented in each individual zone. Thus, we can obtain initial geo-semantic objects with terrain, spectrum and texture homogeneities. A fully convolutional network (FCN)-based classifier (U-Net) is further introduced for supervised classification of land cover. From the perspectives of both visual interpretation and quantitative evaluation, the proposed method achieved robust and high-precision results for all land cover types. We also investigate the contributions of multimodal features for classification accuracy improvement. First, the results showed that additional features resulted in higher classification accuracies than 3-features only; 6-features achieved the best performance on farmland, impervious surfaces and coniferous forests, while 5-features performed well on water and broad-leaved forests. The elevation feature did not have a positive effect on water and broad-leaved forests, which can be explained by their physical distribution in the landscape. Second, the most significant improvement was achieved on water (Kappa coefficient increased from 0.741 to 0.924), followed by coniferous forests (Kappa coefficient increased from 0.629 to 0.805), whereas only a minor improvement was observed for the other three types. Furthermore, the accuracies of farmland and impervious surfaces remained relatively high even without the assistance of additional features, and texture feature plays a key role. The final land cover map was generated by combining the optimal results of each type via a hierarchical integrating strategy. The overall accuracy of classification achieved 90.6%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The pyrolysis of cyanobacteria provides a promising path for the production of nitrogenous compounds. In this work, several catalysts were prepared and applied to the cyanobacteria pyrolysis. The result showed that the synergistic effect between the acidic catalyst and methanol contributes to the formation of bio-oils and nitrogenous compounds. The yield of nitrogenous compounds increased from 46.79% to over 70% with the help of methanol and an acidic catalyst. Pyrolysis over Ni–Al layered double oxide loaded MCM-41 (NiAl-LDO/MCM-41) provided an optimum bio-oil yield of 26.02%, and 25.82% of the nitrogen in the cyanobacteria was transferred into the bio-oil. Nitriles are the main components in nitrogenous compounds and pentadecanenitrile is the major component of nitriles. Although the bio-oil yield upon pyrolysis over Al2O3 loaded MCM-41 (Al2O3/MCM-41) was only 21.18%, the concentration of nitrogenous compounds in the bio-oil was up to 92.59%, and 87.58% of the bio-oil was made of nitriles, whereas pentadecanenitrile accounted for 78.92%. These results gave us a potential way to obtain nitrogenous compounds such as pentadecanenitrile from renewable resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Cyanobacteria was catalytically pyrolyzed in methanol atmosphere using magnesium-aluminum layered double oxide/ZSM-5 composites (MgAl-LDO/ZSM-5) as a catalyst. The largest liquid yield of 67.68% was obtained in methanol atmosphere, which was much higher than that obtained without methanol under same reaction condition. The Gas chromatography-Mass spectrometer data proved that the organics phase contained less O-compounds and N-compounds and more aromatic compounds. And the ultimate analysis results showed that this bio-oil had much higher HHV values and lower O/C molar ratio. The co-processing methanol atmosphere and bifunctional catalyst would be a promising means for improving the quality of bio-oil. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A mathematical model based on the pore model of membrane, liquid–liquid equilibrium model and reaction kinetics model for biodiesel production in membrane reactor was developed. The parameters of the model were calculated from the membrane reaction process of the transesterification between soybean oil and methanol catalyzed by KF/Ca-Mg-Al hydrotalcite. The biodiesel yield calculated by the model fitted the experimental data well. The model simulated results indicated that the membrane reaction system can be divided in biodiesel accumulation and membrane separation of biodiesel stage. In the studied temperature range, the biodiesel yield with the same reaction time increased with the increase in temperature. However, the maximum yields under of all temperatures were almost the same. The results proved that the membrane reactor can shift the transesterification equilibrium to the products side by continuously removing the products. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, an effective method of mechanical vapor recompression coupling Organic Rankine Cycle process is introduced to purify crude biodiesel obtained by solid base-catalyzed transesterification. Mechanical vapor recompression is used for recovering the waste heat of the methanol, while the Organic Rankine Cycle is applied for converting the waste heat of biodiesel into electric energy. Pinch technology is proposed to guide the coupling of mechanical vapor recompression and Organic Rankine Cycle process, the electric energy and waste heat generated by Organic Rankine Cycle are supplied to the mechanical vapor recompression system. Compared with conventional purification process, the total annual cost of proposed process decreases by 55.40% and the greenhouse gas emissions decrease by 76.31% for CO 2 , 76.41% for SO 2 , and 76.42% for NO x , respectively. In addition, the parameters of the proposed process are optimized to achieve a coefficient of performance of 16.03 for mechanical vapor recompression and 14.06% thermal efficiency for Organic Rankine Cycle. • An energy-saving biodiesel purification process was proposed. • Pinch technology was used to guide the process design. • The proposed process reduced exergy destruction. • The proposed process had economic and environmental advantages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Land-use scene classification (LUSC) is a key technique in the field of remote sensing imagery (RSI) interpretation. A convolutional neural network (CNN) is widely used for its ability to autonomously and efficiently extract deep semantic feature maps (DSFMs) from large-scale RSI data. However, CNNs cannot accurately extract the rich spatial structure information of RSI, and the key information of RSI is easily lost due to many pooling layers, so it is difficult to ensure the information integrity of the spatial structure feature maps (SSFMs) and DSFMs of RSI with CNNs only for LUSC, which can easily affect the classification performance. To fully utilize the SSFMs and make up for the insufficiency of CNN in capturing the relationship information between the land-use objects of RSI, while reducing the loss of important information, we propose an effective dual-branch hybrid framework, HFCC-Net, for the LUSC task. The CNN in the upper branch extracts multi-scale DSFMs of the same scene using transfer learning techniques; the graph routing-based CapsNet in the lower branch is used to obtain SSFMs from DSFMs in different scales, and element-by-element summation achieves enhanced representations of SSFMs; a newly designed function is used to fuse the top-level DSFMs with SSFMs to generate discriminant feature maps (DFMs); and, finally, the DFMs are fed into classifier. We conducted sufficient experiments using HFCC-Net on four public datasets. The results show that our method has better classification performance compared to some existing CNN-based state-of-the-art methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dear Editor, Colorectal cancer (CRC) is one of the most commonly diagnosed cancers and cancer-related causes of death worldwide.[1] Early diagnosis is critical to provide curable treatment and improving survival rates for CRC patients.[2] Circulating-free DNA (cfDNA) carrying cancer-specific methylation signature is a promising specific marker for cancer diagnosis.[3] However, previous studies were based either on high-throughput sequencing or did not consider the specificity of the methylation pattern for different cancers. Pan-cancer analysis of genome-wide methylation profiling discover type-specific markers targeting circulating free DNA for the detection of colorectal cancer Furthermore, the methylation status of selected CRC-specific markers was evaluated by MethylTarget sequencing (Genesky) in CRC tissue ( I N i = 227), adjacent normal tissue ( I N i = 24), WBC ( I N i = 52) and cfDNA ( I N i = 14) samples from CRC patients and healthy controls. [Extracted from the article]

Remote sensing scene objective recognition (RSSOR) plays a serious application value in both military and civilian fields. Convolutional neural networks (CNNs) have greatly enhanced the improvement of intelligent objective recognition technology for remote sensing scenes, but most of the methods using CNN for high-resolution RSSOR either use only the feature map of the last layer or directly fuse the feature maps from various layers in the "summation" way, which not only ignores the favorable relationship information between adjacent layers but also leads to redundancy and loss of feature map, which hinders the improvement of recognition accuracy. In this study, a contextual, relational attention-based recognition network (CRABR-Net) was presented, which extracts different convolutional feature maps from CNN, focuses important feature content by using a simple, parameter-free attention module (SimAM), fuses the adjacent feature maps by using the complementary relationship feature map calculation, improves the feature learning ability by using the enhanced relationship feature map calculation, and finally uses the concatenated feature maps from different layers for RSSOR. Experimental results show that CRABR-Net exploits the relationship between the different CNN layers to improve recognition performance, achieves better results compared to several state-of-the-art algorithms, and the average accuracy on AID, UC-Merced, and RSSCN7 can be up to 96.46%, 99.20%, and 95.43% with generic training ratios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cyanobacteria were catalytically pyrolyzed over Mg-Al layered double oxide/ZSM-5 composites (MgAl-LDO/ZSM-5) to produce bio-oil. MgAl-LDO/ZSM-5 with a Mg/Al molar ratio of four was proved to be the best catalyst. Under the optima condition that the final temperature was 823 K, heating rate was 10 K/min and catalyst/algae mass ratio was 0.75, a maximum yield of liquid (41.1%) was achieved at 823 K with a heating rate of 10 K/min and a catalyst/algae mass ratio of 0.75, which was much higher than the one obtained without catalyst. The element analysis results proved that this bio-oil had much lower O/C molar ratio and higher HHV. The GC–MS results showed that the bio-oil had less nitrogenous compounds. MgAl4-LDO/ZSM-5 was proved to be an applicable and effective catalyst to obtain bio-oil from catalytic pyrolysis of water-blooming algae. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, Ca–Mg–Al hydrotalcite was deposited on the inert honeycomb ceramic surface as a second carrier and KF was loaded on the support as an active component. The KF/Ca–Mg–Al hydrotalcite/honeycomb ceramic monolithic catalyst was packed in the membrane reactor for biodiesel production from the transesterification between soybean oil and methanol. The central composite design (CCD) of response surface methodology (RSM) was employed to investigate the effects of reaction temperature, catalyst amount and circulation velocity on the production of biodiesel. A quadratic model was developed to navigate the design space. The optimum condition for the highest biodiesel yield was obtained by the assistance of the model. The catalyst showed a reasonable efficiency and reusability for coupling the monolithic catalyzed transesterification and membrane separation in the membrane reactor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During transesterification process in the fixed-bed reactor, traditional heterogeneous catalyst cannot stand the high pressure drop and would easily breaks at the reactor bottom thus blocking the outlets. KF/γ-Al 2 O 3 /honeycomb ceramic (HC) monolithic catalyst which was prepared in this research can be utilized because of its thermal and mechanical stability. γ-Al 2 O 3 was deposited on the inert HC surface as a second carrier and KF acted as an active component. Loading ratio and loading intensity were both examined in order to select for catalyst with best catalytic performance. Optima reaction condition in the fixed-bed reactor was studied by investigating the effect of residence time, methanol/oil molar ratio and reaction temperature on oil conversion. Experiment results indicated that when the residence time was 33 min, the methanol/oil molar ratio was 18:1, the reaction temperature was 140 °C and with saturated vapor pressure, oil conversion could exceed 96%. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and scanning electron microscope (SEM) indicated that the KF/γ-Al 2 O 3 /HC monolithic catalyst shared the same alkaline catalytic centers identical to KF/γ-Al 2 O 3 . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[2.2]-Paracyclophane derivatives have been promising platforms for applications in biology and materials science. To access pure derivatives thereof, a safe and non-toxic synthetic method for 4- n -propyl-[2.2]-paracyclophane is developed via a microwave-assisted and NH2NH2/KOH reduction route. We introduce microwave-assisted acylation for a synthesis that successfully improves the yield and reduces the reaction time. Notably, an exploration of the length and number of the alkyl chains on the [2.2]-paracyclophane ring did not significantly affect the outcome of this reaction. We synthesized 4- n -butyl-[2.2]-paracyclophane and 4,12-dipropyl-[2.2]-paracyclophane via our protocol with high yields. The regioselectivity of the second electrophilic substitution on 4- n -propyl-[2.2]-paracyclophane occurs at the para position of the less substituted phenyl ring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights: [•] Solid acid catalysis and membrane separation was coupled for biodiesel production. [•] PTSA/MCM-41 was used as a catalyst for biodiesel production in a membrane reactor. [•] Box–Behnken design was employed to analyze and optimize the process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Schisandrin A (Sch A) has a protective effect on cardiomyocytes. Circulating miR-155 levels are related to chronic heart failure (CHF). The present study aimed to clarify the role and the molecular mechanism of Sch A in CHF. C57BL/6JGpt mice were used for an isoproterenol (ISO)-induced CHF model to collect heart samples. Echocardiography was employed to detect heartbeat indicators. The degree of myocardial hypertrophy was evaluated based on the measurement of heart weight (HW), body weight (BW) and tibia length (TL) and the observation using hematoxylin-eosin staining. Sprague-Dawley rats were purchased for the separation of neonatal rat ventricular myocytes (NRVMs), which were treated with ISO for 24 h. Transfection regulated the level of miR-155. The viability of NRVMs was detected via MTT assay. The mRNA and protein levels were measured via reverse transcription-quantitative PCR and western blotting and immunofluorescence was used to detect the content of α-smooth muscle actin (α-SMA). Treatment with ISO resulted in rising left ventricular posterior wall thickness, intra-ventricular septum diastole, left ventricular end diastolic diameter, left ventricular end systolic diameter, HW/BW, HW/TL and falling ejection fraction and fractional shortening, the trend of which could be reversed by Sch A. Sch A ameliorated myocardial hypertrophy in CHF mice. In addition, Sch A inhibited ISO-induced upregulated expressions of atrial natriuretic peptide, B-type natriuretic peptide, B-myosin heavy chain and miR-155 in myocardial tissue. Based on the results in vitro, Sch A had no significant effect on the viability of NRVMs when its concentration was <24 µmol/l. Sch A inhibited the levels of miR-155, α-SMA and the phosphorylation levels of AKT and cyclic AMP response-element binding protein (CREB) in ISO-induced NRVMs, which was reversed by the upregulation of miR-155. Schisandrin A mediated the AKT/CREB signaling pathway to prevent CHF by regulating the expression of miR-155, which may shed light on a possible therapeutic target for CHF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A 500 h endurance test of continuous catalytic transesterificationto biodiesel was conducted in a bench-scale fixed-bed reactor. A designedcylinder shape of KF/Ca–Mg–Al hydrotalcite catalystwas stable through the test with high catalytic activity and mechanicalstrength, converting palm oil to biodiesel with a conversion of morethan 95%. Conditions effects on transesterification under relativehigh pressure (1.0 MPa) were investigated and a one-dimensional heterogeneousmodel of a fixed-bed reactor was developed to describe the reaction-masstransfer behaviors of continuous catalytic transesterification ina bench-scale fixed-bed reactor. With the given reactor size, optimumconditions were proposed as a LHSV (liquid hourly space velocity)of 0.76–0.25 h–1, molar ratio of methanol-to-oilof 9.16–13.7, and temperature of 338–347 K. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Biodiesel has been drawing a great deal of attention on account of its special environment friendly and fuel properties. However, the cost of biodiesel production is still very high compared with that of traditional fossil fuels. In this study, a heterogeneous super acid catalyst and inedible oil were used to reduce the cost of raw materials. Biodiesel was obtained from cotton seed oil (CSO) and catalyzed by the super acid SO42−/ZrO2, which was prepared by impregnation and characterized by infrared spectroscopy, thermo-gravimetric analysis (TGA) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). Different operation parameters of the transesterification of CSO with methanol, such as methanol/oil molar ratio, catalyst amount and loaded mass ratio, reaction time and temperature, were investigated. Under the optimum conditions of methanol to CSO molar ratio of 9:1, 3.5 wt% fresh catalyst (loaded mass ratio is 0.841), 1 h reaction time and reaction temperature of 120 °C, a relatively high biodiesel yield of 98% was obtained. Copyright © 2010 Curtin University of Technology and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The solid base catalyst KF/Ca–Al hydrotalcite was obtained from Ca–Al layered double hydroxides and successfully used in the transesterification of methanol with palm oil to produce biodiesel. With the load of KF, the activity of Ca–Al mixed-oxides had been improved much. For the mass ratio 80wt.%(KF·6H2O to Ca–Al mixed-oxides) catalyst, under the optimal condition: 338K, catalyst amount 5%(wt./wt. oil) and methanol/oil molar ratio 12:1, after 5h reaction, the fatty acid methyl esters yield could reach 97.98%; for the mass ratio 100wt.%(KF·6H2O to Ca–Al mixed-oxides) ones, under the same reaction condition, only needed 3h to get the FAME yield of 99.74%, and even only reacted 1h, the FAME yield could obtain 97.14%. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

An efficient, convenient, and environmentally friendly method was developed for the transesterification of glycols into cyclic carbonates catalysed by 5 wt% KF/Ca-Mg-Al hydrotalcite. Using as a model the reaction of glycerol with dimethyl carbonate (DMC), various parameters such as molar ratios, catalyst type and amount, reaction temperature and solvent were studied to optimise the reaction. Then, using the optimal conditions, the formation of the corresponding cyclic carbonates via transesterification of ethylene, propylene and styrene glycols with DMC using KF/Ca-Mg-Al hydrotalcite as solid base catalyst were achieved in good to high yields in short reaction times. The catalyst was conveniently separated and reused for ten cycles without appreciable decrease in its activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nano-sized HZSM-5 (n-HZSM-5) was synthesized and applied in the aromatization of glycerol. The effects of additives (carboxymethylcellulose sodium, NaCl, sodium alginate, etc.) on the chemical and physic properties of n-HZSM-5 during preparation were investigated. Metal modification was also investigated based on the synthesized n-HZSM-5. The results showed that the addition of carboxymethylcellulose sodium (CMC-Na), NaCl and sodium alginate (SA) led to forming smaller sizes of HZSM-5 and promoted the acid amounts of the catalysts, which increased its catalytic activities for obtaining BTX. The highest BTX yield of ~35% was obtained by SA derived n-HZSM-5, and the life of the catalyst were both obviously promoted by the additives with a highest of ~11 h by γ-(2,3-epoxypropoxy)propytrimethoxysilane (KH-560) derived n-HZSM-5. BTX yields could be improved by 40%by the addition of Zn and Cd in n-HZSM-5 while having little effect on the catalyst life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Federated learning (FL) is susceptible to backdoor attacks, where malicious model updates are covertly inserted into the model's aggregation process, which can result in inaccurate predictions for certain inputs, compromising the integrity of FL. Existing defenses, which aim to identify and remove potentially poisoned model updates, may incorrectly exclude model updates from benign clients with heterogeneous data even in the absence of an attack, compromising the model's usability and resulting in unfair treatment of these benign clients. For defense approaches that utilize adaptive model parameter clipping and noise injection, the continuous injection of noise also considerably deteriorates the model's usability. To address the aforementioned issues, a novel defense named FLMAAcBD (F ederated L earning M odel A nomalous Ac tivation B ehavior D etection) is proposed, which adopts a backdoor anomaly detection module for the global model and a backdoor removal module for potentially malicious model updates to defend against backdoor attacks. Extensive experiments on three datasets validate that FLMAAcBD can defend against various backdoor attacks. Moreover, compared with the baseline methods, FLMAAcBD has less impact on the model's usability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electrocatalytic reduction of CO 2 affords a potential way to mitigate the greenhouse effect and fuel crisis. In this work, we compared highly-dispersed CuO nanocomposites and Cu–Cu 2 O nanocomposites which all derived from Cu x Al-LDH for CO 2 electrochemical reduction. The Cu–Cu 2 O based nanocomposites obtained through the restoration strategies still retain its layered structure, simultaneously increasing dual Cu–Cu 2 O active sites, which exhibit excellent performance in selective reduction of CO 2 to C 2 H 4. The Cu 5 Al-ER obtained through in-situ electrochemical reduction is modified by bulk phase, which can regulate active species, increase surface active sites, enhance C–C coupling. Meanwhile, the electrochemical strategy offers numerous benefits, including gentle conditions, adjustable monitoring, exceptional efficiency and adaptability. We have confirmed that cost-effective Cu–Cu 2 O based nanocomposite derived from Cu 5 Al-LDH can effectively promote C–C coupling during electrochemical CO 2 conversion and improve FE C2H4. The FE C2H4 of Cu 5 Al-ER reaches 36% at −1.2 V vs. RHE. And the current density reaches −172 mA·cm−2 at −1.6 V vs. RHE. The results showed that compared to Cu 5 Al-LDO, the FE C2H4 of Cu 5 Al-ER increased by 2.6 times. In addition, Cu 5 Al-ER exhibits excellent stability during the 12 hours CO 2 catalytic reduction process. • Controllable dual Cu–Cu 2 O sites were derived from cost-effective Cu x Al-LDH. • Cu 5 Al-HR and Cu 5 Al-ER still retain its layered structure. • The copper ratio and reduction method have an impact on the FE C2H4. • Cu 5 Al-ER exhibited superior catalytic performance in CO 2 RR compared to Cu 5 Al-HR. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Catalytic conversion of glycerol to lactic acid has been considered as one of the effective ways to solve the problem of glycerol surplus. In this paper, we reported a facile synthesis of Cu/ZnO/C by direct calcination of Cu-supported zeolitic imidazolate framework(ZIF-8), and the performance of the catalysts for converting glycerol to lactic acid were investigated. The properties of Cu/ZnO/C catalysts were characterized by XRD, BET, SEM and TG techniques. The results showed that nano-copper was distributed uniformly on the porous carbon carrier. The zinc oxide after thermal treatment provided abundant metal active sites and had synergistic effect with nano copper. In addition, the lactic acid selectivity of 84% was obtained at the glycerol conversion of 95.1% at 230 °C, 1.5 MPa and 15% copper loading for 6 h reaction. Moreover, the yield of lactic acid still remained above 80% after being recycled four times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The conversion of biomass energy sources is a crucial direction in the transformation of energy resources, such as cellulose to high-value chemicals. As an important platform compound, 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) is one of the worthwhile products from biomass. Previously, the use of Hf/ZSM-5 catalyst demonstrated excellent catalytic performance, with the yield of HMF reaching 67.50% under optimal reaction conditions (120 min, 190 °C, H2O(NaCl)/THF). Based on the previous work, the effect of a series of metal salts on the preparation of HMF from cellulose catalyzed by Hf/ZSM-5 catalyst was investigated in this paper. This result demonstrates the addition of AlCl3 promoted the production of HMF yield and AlCl3 completed with excellent performance among five metal salts. Moreover, the yield of HMF was improved to 70.95% by adjusting the optimal reaction conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] The electrochemical CO 2 reduction to specific multi-carbon product on copper-based catalysts is subjected to low activity and poor selectivity. Herein, catalyst structure, morphology, and chemical component are systematically studied for bolstering the activity and selectivity of as-prepared catalyzers in this study. Dendritic fibrous nano-silica spheres favor the loading of active species and the transport of reactant from the central radial channel. Cu/DFNS with high dispersion active sites are fabricated through urea-assisted precipitation way. The coexistence of Cu(I)/Cu(II) induces a close combination of Cu active sites and CO 2 on the Cu/DFNS interface, promoting the CO 2 activation and C C coupling. The Cu–O–Si interface (Cu phyllosilicate) can improve CO 2 and CO attachment. Cu/DFNS show the utmost Faradaic efficiency of C 2 H 4 with a value of 53.04% at −1.2 V vs. RHE. And more importantly, in-situ ATR-SEIRAS reveals that the C C coupling is boosted for effectively producing C 2 H 4 as a consequence of the existence of *CO L , *COOH, and *COH intermediates. The mechanism reaction path of Cu/DFNS is inferred to be *CO 2 → *COOH → *CO → *CO*COH → C 2 H 4. Our findings will be helpful to gain insight into the links between morphology, texture, chemical component of catalyzers, and electrochemical reduction of CO 2 , providing valuable guidance in the design of more efficient catalysts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Photocatalytic reduction of CO2 to valuable chemicals is one of the important solutions to the problems of global warming and energy shortage. Here, a Bi2S3/CdIn2S4 S-scheme heterojunction was constructed by a simple solvothermal method, which greatly facilitated the segregation and migration of photogenerated charge carriers. The optimized heterojunction achieved an efficient methyl formate (MF) generation rate (5464 μmol h−1 g−1) in the photocatalytic CO2/methanol reduction system, which was about 29-fold that of pure Bi2S3. The preliminary mechanism of the photocatalytic system over the S-scheme Bi2S3/CdIn2S4 heterojunction was proposed using in situ technology and experimental comparison. This work provides insights into the application of metal sulfide heterojunctions in the field of MF research and the photocatalytic CO2/methanol reduction system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Metabolic derangements and systemic inflammation are related to the progression of colorectal cancer (CRC) and the prognoses of these patients. The survival of stage II and III CRC patients existed considerable heterogeneity highlighting the urgent need for new prediction models. This study aimed to develop and validate prognostic nomograms based on preoperative serum liver enzyme as well as evaluate the clinical utility. Methods: A total of 4014 stage II/III primary CRC patients pathologically diagnosed from January 2007 to December 2013 were included in this study. These patients were randomly divided into a training set (n = 2409) and a testing set (n = 1605). Univariate and multivariate Cox analyses were used to select the independent factors for predicting overall survival (OS) and disease-free survival (DFS) of stage II/III CRC patients. Next, nomograms were constructed and validated to predict the OS and DFS of individual CRC patients. The clinical utility of nomograms, tumor-node-metastasis (TNM), and the American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) system was evaluated using time-dependent ROC and decision curve analyses. Results: Among seven preoperative serum liver enzyme markers, aspartate aminotransferase-to-alanine aminotransferase ratio (De Ritis ratio) was identified as an independent factor for predicting both OS and DFS of stage II/III CRC patients. The nomograms incorporated De Ritis ratio and significant clinicopathological features achieved good accuracy in terms of OS and DFS prediction, with C-index of 0.715 and 0.692, respectively. The calibration curve showed good agreement between prediction by nomogram and actual observation. The results of time-dependent ROC and decision curve analyses suggested that the nomograms had improved discrimination and greater clinical benefits compared with TNM and AJCC staging. Conclusions: De Ritis ratio was an independent predictor in predicting both the OS and DFS of patients with stage II/III CRC. Nomograms based on De Ritis ratio and clinicopathological features showed better clinical utility, which is expected to help clinicians develop appropriate individual treatment strategies for patients with stage II /III CRC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An abstract of the article "An Efficient and Green Transesterification of Glycols into Cyclic Carbonates Catalyzed by KF/Ca-Mg-Al Hydrotalcite" by Mei Hong and colleagues is presented.

Liquid phase and one-step reaction for furfural (FFR) hydrogenated to tetrahydrofurfuryl alcohol (THFA) was conducted by employing noble metal-absence and toxicity-free, bimetallic Ni-Co catalysts. The bimetallic Ni-Co catalysts with different molar ratio of Ni to Co and two monometallic catalysts (Ni, Co) were synthesized by conventional incipient-wetness impregnation method with short channeled SBA-15 as support. Among these catalysts, highly selective hydrogenation of FFR to THFA was attained over Ni-Co/SBA-15 catalysts. The impact of molar ratio of Ni/Co was studied with a fixed Ni loading (10 wt %) in bare support. The samples were characterized by N 2 sorption, XRD, XPS, H 2 -TPR, SEM, TEM and CO chemisorption. The results confirmed that the reducibility of Ni-catalysts can be improved by incorporating Co metal and revealed that appropriate amount of spinel NiCo 2 O 4 oxides is favorable to uniform and high dispersion of Ni 0 and CoO over short channeled SBA-15, which would be benefit for the catalytic performance. For catalytic activity investigation, other four mesoporous SiO 2 materials (MCM-41, MCM-4, MCF-2 and common SBA-15) were employed as supports to investigate the effect on the hydrogenation of FFR and the reaction parameters including the reaction temperature, initial of H 2 pressure, reaction time and the reusability of the catalysts were also studied. 100% of FFR conversion and 92.1% of THFA selectivity were achieved at 90 °C, 50 bar of initial H 2 and 2.0 h over catalyst Ni-Co/SBA-15 when the molar ratio of Ni to Co was 0.67. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of bifunctional P‐Zr‐SBA‐15 catalysts with Lewis acid and Brønsted acid sites were prepared by modifying mesoporous material SBA‐15 with Zr4+ and phosphate group, which were used in the conversion of xylose and xylan into furfural. The structure and acidic characteristics of the catalyst were analyzed by X‐ray diffraction, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, N2 adsorption desorption, scanning/transmission electron microscopy, X‐ray photoelectron spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis, NH3 temperature programmed desorption, and pyridine adsorption infrared spectroscopy. The effects of different process parameters on the catalytic performance of the catalyst were studied. when using the xylose and xylan as substrates, the furfural yield were 80.3 % and 68.8 % under the optimal conditions in the H2O(NaCl)/toluene (3/3 mL) biphasic solvent system, respectively, and 52.5 % furfural yield was obtained using xylose as substrate in aqueous system. In addition, the catalyst has good thermal stability and easy recovery in the recycling experiment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Herein, a kind of three-dimensional hollow Mg-Ca-Al hydrotalcite-like compounds (HTLCs) microsphere was prepared by self-assembly of hydrotalcite-like nanosheets. Mg-Ca-Al HTLCs microsphere (MS) has large specific surface area and large pore size, and the modification of KF·2H2O increases numerous alkaline active sites on the surface of the catalyst. The prepared catalyst has excellent catalytic effect for the production of biodiesel by transesterification. Under the optimal conditions of the catalyst addition amount which accounts for 2% of the weight of oil, the biodiesel yield of the best catalyst is as high as 92% within 30 minutes. This article also provides a paradigm of a rational structural design for regulating the morphology of HTLCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The properties of the support have profound effects on the catalytic performance of the supported catalyst. A series of NiMo bimetallic catalysts supported on niobium phosphate supports with different structures via the impregnation method was prepared. The effect of the acidity and porosity of the support on the dispersity and valence state of metal components and the synergistic interaction between Ni and Mo were investigated using XRD, N2-physisorption, NH3-TPD, XPS, H2-TPR, and TEM. The catalytic performance of the catalysts was evaluated in the hydrodeoxygenation of oleic acid (OA). The results demonstrate that the stronger acidity of the support leads to better dispersion of the metal Ni and it is more difficult to reduce the metal Ni. It was shown that the synergistic interaction between Ni and Mo, which could increase the concentration of oxygen vacancies (Ov) in the catalyst and the charge density on the surface of Ni atoms, is the main reason for the catalyst showing high selectivity to n-octadecane (C18). The reaction results showed that the highest selectivity to C18 (91.3%) could be achieved with 98.4% conversion of oleic acid over the Ni2Mo/NbP-3 catalyst under the condition of reaction temperature of 260 °C, 3 MPa initial H2 pressure, and reaction time of 7 h. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] Heterojunction engineering is a very prospective approach to modulate the photocatalytic behaviors of semiconductors. Herein, Venus flytrap-like NiCo hydroxide nanoflowers (HNF) with surface modification by different contents of CoSn(OH) 6 were fabricated in situ for the first time. Interestingly, CoSn(OH) 6 nanocubes (NC) are monodispersed on the nanosheet surface of NiCo HNF. Experimental characterizations and theoretical calculations comprehensively demonstrate the surface Sn atoms of CoSn(OH) 6 are effectively embedded into the NiCo HNF interlayers, and co-sharing of the hydroxyl enables intimate contact in the heterointerface of NiCo HNF/CoSn(OH) 6 hybrids and thereby largely shortens the charge migrating distance, contributing to an efficient interfacial charge migration and promoting charge separation. The optimized NiCo HNF/CoSn(OH) 6 exhibits the remarkably enhanced photocatalytic efficiency for CO 2 reduction with a TON of 601.2 and the CO and CH 4 yield is about 3 folds that over CoSn(OH) 6 NC. DRIFTS reveals the reaction intermediates in the CO 2 photocatalytic process and proposes a possible mechanism for photocatalytic CO 2 reaction. These findings may pave the way for rational engineering design of non-precious highly-dispersed broadband visible-light-driven CO 2 reduction heterostructure catalysts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using etherification to convert glycerol into biofuel additives is an effective way to solve the current problem of excess glycerol. In this study, a series of environmentally friendly (x)HPW/ZrO2 catalysts were synthesized for the etherification of glycerol and tert-butyl alcohol (TBA). The internal microstructure and acidity analysis of the synthesized samples were derived from BET, XRD, Raman spectroscopy, FTIR, SEM, NH3-TPD and Py-FTIR. The results revealed that the synthesized catalysts retained the complete Keggin structure of phosphotungstic acid (HPW) which supported on it. The (15)HPW/ZrO2 catalyst with suitable structure and acidity had an excellent catalytic effect on the etherification reaction. Driven by the (15)HPW/ZrO2 catalyst, the optimal reaction conditions were determined from parameters of reaction temperature, time, molar rate of glycerol and TBA, and catalyst dosage. 93.2% glycerol conversion and 42.5% selectivity of multi-substituted tert-butyl glycerol ethers (DTBG + TTBG) were obtained under optimal conditions. In addition, even after a total of four consecutive reactions, (15)HPW/ZrO2 catalyst still demonstrated relatively good catalytic activity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An inorganic catalytic membrane constructed of a ceramic membrane (CM) support and catalytic coating (active component SO42-/TiO2) was prepared and used as a heterogeneous catalyst in the esterification of oleic acid with methanol for biodiesel production. SO42- /TiO2-CM catalytic membrane was analyzed by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction patterns, and scanning electron microscopy together with energy dispersive analyzer for X-ray (EDS). It was found that the SO42- /TiO2 particles were well coated on the surface of CM matrix, and the oleic acid conversion could become 97.6% at the optimum condition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Methanol and dimethyl carbonate (DMC) mixture is present in the industrial manufacturing process of DMC, which is made from the catalytic oxidative carbonylation of methanol. The separation of methanol and DMC is important but difficult due to the formation of an azeotropic mixture. This work has been focused on a study of phosphoric-based ionic liquids (ILs) as green solvents for the separation of methanol and DMC in the extraction process. The knowledge of liquid–liquid equilibrium (LLE) of this mixture is essential for the design of the extraction separation process. For this reason, LLE data for the ternary systems {methanol + DMC + 1-methyl-3-methylimidazolium dimethylphosphate ([MMIM][DMP])} and {methanol + DMC + 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium diethylphosphate ([EMIM][DEP])} were measured at T = (298.2 and 313.2) K and atmospheric pressure. The solute distribution ratio and selectivity of the methanol, derived from the tie-lines data, were calculated and analyzed in order to evaluate the capacity of the studied ILs as solvents in liquid extraction process. The experimental results show that the values of selectivity for the studied ILs follow this order: [MMIM][DMP] > [EMIM][DEP]. Finally, the experimental LLE data for the studied ternary systems were compared with the calculated values obtained by means of the non-random two liquid (NRTL) model. The NRTL model was verified to accurately correlate the experimental LLE data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Synthesis of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) from carbohydrates was achieved over the homogeneous catalyst acid poly(4-styrenesulfonic acid) (PSS). The various reaction conditions like reaction temperature, reaction time, various solvent, solvent volume, and catalyst dosages were explored. The results showed that the PSS catalyst resulted in 86.8% HMF yield from fructose and 48.5% HMF yield from glucose in solvent 1-methyl-2-pyrrolidone and dimethyl sulfoxide, respectively. The catalyst has reused five cycles without obviously reduced on HMF yield, suggesting that PSS showed high catalytic activity at recycle experiment. Thus, PSS was a potential candidate for homogeneous catalyst acids and can convert carbohydrate compound into HMF conveniently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background and Objective: Ornidazole, the third generation of nitroimidazole derivatives after metronidazole and tinidazole, it exerts both bactericidal and antiprotozoal effects. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the pharmacokinetic and bioequivalence of two ornidazole tablets manufactured by two different manufacturers based on their pharmacokinetic parameters.Fasted and fed healthy Chinese volunteers participated in a randomized sequence, single-dose, open-label, two-period crossover trial. There were 24 participants in both the fed study and the fasted study. Following a 7-day washout period before receiving the alternative formulation, eligible research participants were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive a single dosage of either the reference formulation or the test formulation. Following tablet administration, plasma samples were obtained over 72 h and analyzed using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) to evaluate ornidazole contents. maximum plasma concentration (Cmax), time to Cmax (Tmax), the area under the curve (AUC) from t = 0 to infinity (AUC0–∞), AUC from t = 0 to the last quantifiable concentration (AUC0–t), half-life (t1/2), and terminal elimination rate constant (z) were evaluated as pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters. The safety evaluation involved adverse events (AEs) incidence and alterations in laboratory tests (hepatic function, blood biochemistry, hematology, and urinalysis) or vital signs (temperature, pulse, and blood pressure).For the bioequivalence assessment in the fast trial, the prime PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulation revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 100.97% (99.12–102.85%), 99.88% (90.63–110.08%), and 101.12% (99.17–103.11%), respectively. For the bioequivalence assessment in the fed trial, the key PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulations revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 103.00% (100.94–105.11%), 101.90% (99.63–104.22%), and 102.99% (100.87–105.16%), respectively. The geometric mean ratios (GMRs) for the primary pharmacokinetic parameters (Cmax, AUC0–72, and AUC0–∞) between the two formulations and the corresponding 90% confidence intervals (CIs) were all within the range of 80.00–125.00% for both the fasting and fed states. Both treatments have comparable safety profiles.The bioequivalence and tolerability of ornidazole tablet reference and test formulations were evaluated among healthy Chinese participants under both fasting and fed conditions. The results indicated that both formulations were bioequivalent and generally well tolerated; besides, the interaction between food and drug may affect drug pharmacokinetics.CTR20212873, registered on 15 November 2021; ChiCTR2300069098, registered on 7 March 2023.Patients and Methods: Ornidazole, the third generation of nitroimidazole derivatives after metronidazole and tinidazole, it exerts both bactericidal and antiprotozoal effects. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the pharmacokinetic and bioequivalence of two ornidazole tablets manufactured by two different manufacturers based on their pharmacokinetic parameters.Fasted and fed healthy Chinese volunteers participated in a randomized sequence, single-dose, open-label, two-period crossover trial. There were 24 participants in both the fed study and the fasted study. Following a 7-day washout period before receiving the alternative formulation, eligible research participants were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive a single dosage of either the reference formulation or the test formulation. Following tablet administration, plasma samples were obtained over 72 h and analyzed using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) to evaluate ornidazole contents. maximum plasma concentration (Cmax), time to Cmax (Tmax), the area under the curve (AUC) from t = 0 to infinity (AUC0–∞), AUC from t = 0 to the last quantifiable concentration (AUC0–t), half-life (t1/2), and terminal elimination rate constant (z) were evaluated as pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters. The safety evaluation involved adverse events (AEs) incidence and alterations in laboratory tests (hepatic function, blood biochemistry, hematology, and urinalysis) or vital signs (temperature, pulse, and blood pressure).For the bioequivalence assessment in the fast trial, the prime PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulation revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 100.97% (99.12–102.85%), 99.88% (90.63–110.08%), and 101.12% (99.17–103.11%), respectively. For the bioequivalence assessment in the fed trial, the key PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulations revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 103.00% (100.94–105.11%), 101.90% (99.63–104.22%), and 102.99% (100.87–105.16%), respectively. The geometric mean ratios (GMRs) for the primary pharmacokinetic parameters (Cmax, AUC0–72, and AUC0–∞) between the two formulations and the corresponding 90% confidence intervals (CIs) were all within the range of 80.00–125.00% for both the fasting and fed states. Both treatments have comparable safety profiles.The bioequivalence and tolerability of ornidazole tablet reference and test formulations were evaluated among healthy Chinese participants under both fasting and fed conditions. The results indicated that both formulations were bioequivalent and generally well tolerated; besides, the interaction between food and drug may affect drug pharmacokinetics.CTR20212873, registered on 15 November 2021; ChiCTR2300069098, registered on 7 March 2023.Results: Ornidazole, the third generation of nitroimidazole derivatives after metronidazole and tinidazole, it exerts both bactericidal and antiprotozoal effects. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the pharmacokinetic and bioequivalence of two ornidazole tablets manufactured by two different manufacturers based on their pharmacokinetic parameters.Fasted and fed healthy Chinese volunteers participated in a randomized sequence, single-dose, open-label, two-period crossover trial. There were 24 participants in both the fed study and the fasted study. Following a 7-day washout period before receiving the alternative formulation, eligible research participants were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive a single dosage of either the reference formulation or the test formulation. Following tablet administration, plasma samples were obtained over 72 h and analyzed using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) to evaluate ornidazole contents. maximum plasma concentration (Cmax), time to Cmax (Tmax), the area under the curve (AUC) from t = 0 to infinity (AUC0–∞), AUC from t = 0 to the last quantifiable concentration (AUC0–t), half-life (t1/2), and terminal elimination rate constant (z) were evaluated as pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters. The safety evaluation involved adverse events (AEs) incidence and alterations in laboratory tests (hepatic function, blood biochemistry, hematology, and urinalysis) or vital signs (temperature, pulse, and blood pressure).For the bioequivalence assessment in the fast trial, the prime PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulation revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 100.97% (99.12–102.85%), 99.88% (90.63–110.08%), and 101.12% (99.17–103.11%), respectively. For the bioequivalence assessment in the fed trial, the key PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulations revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 103.00% (100.94–105.11%), 101.90% (99.63–104.22%), and 102.99% (100.87–105.16%), respectively. The geometric mean ratios (GMRs) for the primary pharmacokinetic parameters (Cmax, AUC0–72, and AUC0–∞) between the two formulations and the corresponding 90% confidence intervals (CIs) were all within the range of 80.00–125.00% for both the fasting and fed states. Both treatments have comparable safety profiles.The bioequivalence and tolerability of ornidazole tablet reference and test formulations were evaluated among healthy Chinese participants under both fasting and fed conditions. The results indicated that both formulations were bioequivalent and generally well tolerated; besides, the interaction between food and drug may affect drug pharmacokinetics.CTR20212873, registered on 15 November 2021; ChiCTR2300069098, registered on 7 March 2023.Conclusion: Ornidazole, the third generation of nitroimidazole derivatives after metronidazole and tinidazole, it exerts both bactericidal and antiprotozoal effects. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the pharmacokinetic and bioequivalence of two ornidazole tablets manufactured by two different manufacturers based on their pharmacokinetic parameters.Fasted and fed healthy Chinese volunteers participated in a randomized sequence, single-dose, open-label, two-period crossover trial. There were 24 participants in both the fed study and the fasted study. Following a 7-day washout period before receiving the alternative formulation, eligible research participants were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive a single dosage of either the reference formulation or the test formulation. Following tablet administration, plasma samples were obtained over 72 h and analyzed using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) to evaluate ornidazole contents. maximum plasma concentration (Cmax), time to Cmax (Tmax), the area under the curve (AUC) from t = 0 to infinity (AUC0–∞), AUC from t = 0 to the last quantifiable concentration (AUC0–t), half-life (t1/2), and terminal elimination rate constant (z) were evaluated as pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters. The safety evaluation involved adverse events (AEs) incidence and alterations in laboratory tests (hepatic function, blood biochemistry, hematology, and urinalysis) or vital signs (temperature, pulse, and blood pressure).For the bioequivalence assessment in the fast trial, the prime PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulation revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 100.97% (99.12–102.85%), 99.88% (90.63–110.08%), and 101.12% (99.17–103.11%), respectively. For the bioequivalence assessment in the fed trial, the key PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulations revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 103.00% (100.94–105.11%), 101.90% (99.63–104.22%), and 102.99% (100.87–105.16%), respectively. The geometric mean ratios (GMRs) for the primary pharmacokinetic parameters (Cmax, AUC0–72, and AUC0–∞) between the two formulations and the corresponding 90% confidence intervals (CIs) were all within the range of 80.00–125.00% for both the fasting and fed states. Both treatments have comparable safety profiles.The bioequivalence and tolerability of ornidazole tablet reference and test formulations were evaluated among healthy Chinese participants under both fasting and fed conditions. The results indicated that both formulations were bioequivalent and generally well tolerated; besides, the interaction between food and drug may affect drug pharmacokinetics.CTR20212873, registered on 15 November 2021; ChiCTR2300069098, registered on 7 March 2023.Trial Registration: Ornidazole, the third generation of nitroimidazole derivatives after metronidazole and tinidazole, it exerts both bactericidal and antiprotozoal effects. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the pharmacokinetic and bioequivalence of two ornidazole tablets manufactured by two different manufacturers based on their pharmacokinetic parameters.Fasted and fed healthy Chinese volunteers participated in a randomized sequence, single-dose, open-label, two-period crossover trial. There were 24 participants in both the fed study and the fasted study. Following a 7-day washout period before receiving the alternative formulation, eligible research participants were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive a single dosage of either the reference formulation or the test formulation. Following tablet administration, plasma samples were obtained over 72 h and analyzed using liquid chromatography tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS) to evaluate ornidazole contents. maximum plasma concentration (Cmax), time to Cmax (Tmax), the area under the curve (AUC) from t = 0 to infinity (AUC0–∞), AUC from t = 0 to the last quantifiable concentration (AUC0–t), half-life (t1/2), and terminal elimination rate constant (z) were evaluated as pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters. The safety evaluation involved adverse events (AEs) incidence and alterations in laboratory tests (hepatic function, blood biochemistry, hematology, and urinalysis) or vital signs (temperature, pulse, and blood pressure).For the bioequivalence assessment in the fast trial, the prime PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulation revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 100.97% (99.12–102.85%), 99.88% (90.63–110.08%), and 101.12% (99.17–103.11%), respectively. For the bioequivalence assessment in the fed trial, the key PK parameters comparison between the reference and test formulations revealed that the GMR (90% CI) values for AUC0–t, Cmax, and AUC0–∞ were 103.00% (100.94–105.11%), 101.90% (99.63–104.22%), and 102.99% (100.87–105.16%), respectively. The geometric mean ratios (GMRs) for the primary pharmacokinetic parameters (Cmax, AUC0–72, and AUC0–∞) between the two formulations and the corresponding 90% confidence intervals (CIs) were all within the range of 80.00–125.00% for both the fasting and fed states. Both treatments have comparable safety profiles.The bioequivalence and tolerability of ornidazole tablet reference and test formulations were evaluated among healthy Chinese participants under both fasting and fed conditions. The results indicated that both formulations were bioequivalent and generally well tolerated; besides, the interaction between food and drug may affect drug pharmacokinetics.CTR20212873, registered on 15 November 2021; ChiCTR2300069098, registered on 7 March 2023. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • The *CO spillover was induced by bimetallic xZnO@yCuO active centers. • By utilizing flower-shaped ZnO as a source of *CO intermediate, CO can spillover to neighboring dandelion-like CuO active sites. • In-situ ATR-SEIRAS also unveils that *CO spillover increases the surface coverage of *CO on the catalyst. • The Zn-rich 3ZnO@CuO catalyst shows the highest FE CO of 89.94 % at −1.2 V vs. RHE. • A remarkable C 2 H 4 selectivity of 46.37 % for equal-Zn/Cu ZnO@CuO at a more positive potential of −1.1 V vs. RHE is achieved. Cu-based catalysts attaining high catalytic activity and selectivity towards C 2+ product remains a major obstacle, which has garnered significant attention. *CO plays a key role as an intermediate in the next process of C–C dimerization. In this study, we devise a novel approach for generating *CO in situ and facilitating its spillover to neighboring dandelion-liked CuO active sites, utilizing flower-shaped ZnO as a source of *CO intermediate. Consequently, the Zn-rich 3ZnO@CuO catalyst shows the highest Faraday efficiency of CO (FE CO) is 89.94 % at −1.2 V vs. RHE. Additionally, a remarkable C 2 H 4 selectivity of 46.37 % for ZnO@CuO at a more positive potential of −1.1 V vs. RHE is achieved. In-situ ATR-SEIRAS also unveils that *CO spillover increases the surface coverage of *CO on the catalyst, ultimately improving the selectivity for C–C coupling and C 2 H 4 production. The relationship between structure and performance will offer guidance for the design of Cu-based catalysts with superior efficiency in CO 2 reduction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The dehydrogenation and isomerization of glycerol to produce lactic acid is an important way to realize the effective utilization of biodiesel by-products. Currently, precious metal catalysts have been widely used in the preparation of lactic acid from glycerol. In this paper, Cu-supported zeolitic imidazolate framework (ZIF-8) crystals of different loadings were synthesized by the reaction of zinc nitrate, copper nitrate and 2-aminobenzophenone at room temperature, and were applied to the reaction of glycerol to lactic acid. Characterizations including XRD, XPS, SEM, TEM, BET, FT-IR, UV–vis DRS, CO2-TPD and TG were carried out to evaluate the morphology and properties of the catalysts. The results showed that the lattice structure of body centered cubic of the materials was successfully formed, and nano-copper was distributed uniformly on the supports, which provided abundant active alkaline sites. In addition, the catalytic reactions achieved good results under optimum copper loading and reaction conditions, which the glycerol conversion and lactic acid yield can reach 97.5% and 84.2%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Alkylphosphinates have received extensive attention in the past few decades because of their very useful mechanical properties, electrical properties, low density, and low toxicity, and have been widely used in flame-retardant materials and other fields. In this work, aluminum diethylphosphinate is successfully synthesized under atmospheric pressure. More importantly, two novel dialkylphosphinates, aluminum dioctylphosphinate and aluminum didecylphosphinate, are first synthesized and characterized. The structures of these aluminum dialkylphosphinates are confirmed by nuclear magnetic resonance, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, and high-resolution mass spectrometry, and the microscopic morphology and thermal stability are analyzed by scanning electron microscopy and thermogravimetric analysis, respectively. Furthermore, conditions for the synthesis of aluminum dioctylphosphinate are optimized. Compared with the traditional method of synthesizing dialkylphosphinates under high pressure, the method reported in this paper has the advantages of high safety, easy operation, and low economic cost, which makes it suitable for industrial production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Image segmentation is a basic task of Object-Based Image Analysis (OBIA) in remote sensing. Traditionally, the algorithms for this task are mostly based on region merging procedure. But the segmented objects may correlate poorly with the actual object boundary. Inspired by the recent remarkable improvements on edge detection with deep learning, we propose a semantic edge-guided segmentation with deep learning method to extract meaningful geographic objects from High-resolution Remote Sensing (HRS) images. The method consists of three stages: in the first stage, geographic object boundaries are manually labelled and randomly augmented to generate training data; in the second stage, a fully convolutional neural networks with Encoder-Decoder structure and multiscale supervised nets are trained to detect edges at multiple scales. The detected edges with semantic information do not only include local details but also global edge structure, which are more in accordance with human perception and suitable for conversion to actual geographic boundaries; in the third stage, the detected edges are thinned and extended to construct complete object boundaries according to calculated edge strength. The average precision of our method for the two datasets was 0.902 and 0.866, which is higher than the state-of-the-art deep learning models including RCF, BDCN and DexiNed have obtained. And line IoU improvement of at least 8.46% and F1 score improvement of at least 8.13% in the two datasets. The code of DDLNet is publicly available at . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A series of vanadium-chromium oxide (VCrO) catalysts supported on silica was prepared by wetness impregnation method with different Cr/V molar ratios from 0.2 to 1.0. These catalysts were characterized by XRD, TG, temperature-programmed desorption of ammonia (NH-TPD), X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS), and Raman spectroscopy, and their catalytic activity was evaluated in the ammoxidation of 3-picoline (3-PIC) to nicotinonitrile (NN). The results of XRD, TG, Raman, and XPS confirmed that the active components on the silica surface were mainly amorphous VO and CrVO. The results of NH-TPD showed that acidity of the catalysts decreased with the increase of Cr/V ratio. Catalytic results revealed that acidity of the catalysts was closely related to the catalytic performance. Low acidity gave low conversion of 3-PIC and high NN selectivity. Furthermore, the conversion of 3-PIC increased with rise in reaction temperature, and the selectivity of NN was slightly influenced by the 3-PIC conversion. Therefore, among the catalysts (Cr/V ratio was 0.2, 0.4, 0.6) tested, Cr/V-0.6 catalyst retained the lowest acidity and exhibited the highest selectivity and yield of NN in the ammoxidation of 3-PIC. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The chitosan doped polyvinyl alcohol film are prepared by blending heating method. The prepared membrane is characterized by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrometer (FTIR), scanning electron microscope (SEM), atomic force microscope (AFM) and universal testing machine. The surface of the cast membranes is generally flat, and the pervaporation process would cause the membrane to have a wrinkled shape. These membranes can be used for pervaporation to separate methanol/biodiesel mixtures. This paper studies the effects of different chitosan additions, feed temperature and feed concentration on membrane performance. When the chitosan doping amount is 30 % by mass of polyvinyl alcohol at 40 °C, the maximum flux reaches 569.212 g m−2 h−1. At the same time, the separation factor increases as the methanol concentration in the liquid decreases. When the methanol mass fraction is 10 %, the separation factor can reach 116.717. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The production of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) from cellulose is of great significance for the high-value utilization of biomass, although this route currently faces the challenge of low efficiency. In the present work, a series of effective (x)Hf/ZSM-5 catalysts were developed for HMF production from cellulose, and analyzed by BET, XRD, SEM, ICP, NH3-TPD, Py-FTIR techniques. Driven by the (5)Hf/ZSM-5 catalyst, HMF with a yield of up to 67.5% and 17.2% of furfural are simultaneously obtained from cellulose in the H2O(NaCl)/THF biphasic system. Moreover, after four consecutive cycles, (5)Hf/ZSM-5 catalyst still maintained part of its catalytic activity. The 67.5% HMF yield achieved herein is one of the highest yields achieved in the conversion reaction using cellulose as a substrate, and the catalytic performance of the H2O(NaCl)/THF system containing the (5)Hf/ZSM-5 catalyst is even comparable to that of the expensive ionic liquid system. This result reflects the application prospect of (5)Hf/ZSM-5 catalyst in the future industrial production process of HMF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • A series of catalysts derived from silicotungstic acid (SiW) intercalated with CuZnFe hydrotalcite-like compounds (HTLCs). • The introduction of SiW significantly improved the selectivity towards 1,3-PDO, owing to the increased number of Brønsted acid sites. • The catalyst intercalating 30 wt.% SiW showed the highest selectivity (22.4%) to 1,3-PDO at 68.9% glycerol conversion. A series of catalysts derived from silicotungstic acid (SiW) intercalated with CuZnFe hydrotalcite-like compounds (HTLCs) via ion-exchange method was prepared and characterized by N 2 -physisorption, XRD, TEM, SEM, H 2 -TPR, FT-IR, and Py-IR spectra. The intercalation of SiW species into CuZnFe HTLCs was confirmed by these characterization techniques, while the catalytic performance was evaluated for glycerol hydrogenolysis. It was found that introduction of SiW significantly enhanced the selectivity towards 1,3-propanediols (1,3-PDO), owing to the increased Brønsted acid introduction, as demonstrated by Py-IR analysis. The catalyst intercalating 30 wt.% SiW showed the highest selectivity (22.4%) to 1,3-PDO at 68.9% glycerol transformation. The catalytic performance was discussed and correlated with the physicochemical properties of these catalysts. The present contribution provides an economical approach to convert surplus glycerol from biodiesel manufacture to valuable propanediols. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • CuFe PBA@Cu-HHTP core–shell dual MOFs with varied shell thicknesses were prepared. • CFH-1 improves photogenerated carrier separation and transfer compared to CuFe PBA. • The electron density near Cu site is regulated by constructing heterojunction. • CFH-1 showed superior photocatalytic CO 2 -to-CO yield about 14 times than CuFe PBA. Flexibly and controllably regulating the functionality of the core–shell system is still challenging, which is largely determined by the shell thickness and core–shell interface. Here, elaborately designed core–shell dual MOFs were constructed via in-situ growth of Cu-HHTP (HHTP = 2,3,6,7,10,11-hexahydroxytriphenylene) shell with adjustable thicknesses over CuFe Prussian blue analogue (PBA). The thin-shell CuFe PBA@Cu-HHTP heterojunction (CFH-1) improves charge separation and transfer compared to CuFe PBA and thick-shell heterojunction. Density functional theory results indicate the efficient regulation of electron density near Cu site via constructing heterojunction. The photocatalytic CO 2 -to-CO activity of CFH-1 is improved (29.3 μmol·g−1) by ∼ 14 times than pristine CuFe PBA. This study provides information on charge separation at the core–shell structure interface to achieve efficient photocatalytic CO 2 conversion. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]