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Nuclear power is a high-quality clean energy source, but nuclear waste is generated during operation. The waste continuously releases heat during disposal, increasing the adjoining rock temperature and affecting the safety of the disposal site. Basalt is widely considered a commonly used rock type in the repository. This study of basalt's mechanical characteristics and damage evolution after thermal damage, with its far-reaching engineering value, was conducted by combining experimental work and theory. Uniaxial compression tests were conducted on basalt exposed to 25 °C, 500 °C, 700 °C, 900 °C, and 1100 °C conditions, and acoustic emission (AE) equipment was utilized to observe the acoustic emission phenomenon during deformation. This study was carried out to examine the mechanical characteristics, the sound emission features, the progression of damage laws, and the stress–strain framework of basalt after exposure to different types of thermal harm. As the temperature rises, the rock's maximum strength declines steadily, the peak strain rises in tandem, the rock sample's ductility is augmented, the failure mode changes from shear to tensile failure, and cracks in the failure area are observed. At room temperature, the acoustic emission signal is more vigorous than in the initial stage of rock sample loading due to thermal damage; however, after the linear elastic stage is entered, its activity is lessened. In cases where the rock approaches collapse, there is a significant surge in acoustic emission activity, leading to the peak frequency of acoustic emission ringing. The cumulative ring count of acoustic emission serves as the basis for the definition of the damage variable. At room temperature, the damage evolution of rock samples can be broken down into four distinct stages. This defined damage variable is more reflective of the entire failure process. After exposure to high temperatures, the initial damage of the rock sample becomes more extensive, and the damage variable tends to be stable with strain evolution. The stress–strain constitutive model of basalt deformation is derived based on the crack axial strain law and acoustic emission parameters. A powerful relationship between theoretical and experimental curves is evident. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sulfide minerals (mainly FeS2) contained in lead-zinc tailings are easy to be acidified in the air. The acidification mechanism is that the tailing sand generates sulfuric acid and sulfate under the catalysis of oxidant, water and oxygen. The acidic liquid generated by the reaction will continue to react with metal oxides to form an insoluble precipitate.In order to reveal the corresponding changes of chemical properties and physical properties of lead-zinc tailing sand during acidification, a series of reaction processes of tailings under natural conditions were simulated by immersion test in laboratory.It is found through the test that with the deepening of acidification, the coarse particles of tailing sand dissolve, resulting in the decrease of iron concentration in the compound, the increase of fine particles, the increase of specific surface area, the decrease of surface friction and occlusion friction between particles, resulting in the decrease of internal friction angle, and the decrease of the safety of tailings dam. words.

Dynamic characteristics of rock masses are an important part of the safety and stability analysis in rock mass engineering. The split Hopkinson pressure bar (SHPB) tests on the phosphate rock in Yichang are conducted, combined with the Split-desktop digital image method and mesoscopic discrete element method (DEM). Both macroscopic and mesoscopic characteristics of the phosphate rock have been studied from such perspectives as stress and strain, fractal characteristics of fragment size, and the spatial and temporal evolution of cracks. The research results show that the dynamic strength of the phosphate rock presents obvious strain rate effect, but the dynamic elasticity modulus is not so sensitive to the strain rate. There is a great correlation between the failure degree of rock specimens and the strain rate. The fractal characteristics of specimen fragments can be used to quantitatively evaluate the rock failure degree under impact loading. According to the characteristics of crack propagation, the rock failure process under the impact can be divided into four stages, namely the elastic crack-free stage, the crack initiation stage, the rapid crack growth stage, and the slow crack development stage. Moreover, with the increase of impact loading, micro-cracks are activated in large quantities. The specimens gradually change from the local damage mode to the axial splitting failure mode and to the crushing failure mode, and in this process, the number of tensile cracks takes an absolute advantage compared with the number of shear cracks. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To explore the changes and significance of serum CXC chemokine ligand 16 (CXCL-16), growth differentiation factor 15 (GDF-15) and lipoprotein-related phospholipase A2 (PLA-2) levels in patients with cerebral infarction., Methods: A total of 87 patients with cerebral infarction between August 2019 and May 2020 in our hospital were selected as the disease group, and 50 healthy patients were selected as the healthy control group. Enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay was used to detect serum CXCL-16, GDF-15, PLA-2 expression levels in all subjects. A comprehensive evaluation was made in terms of changes of various indicator levels in patients while the changes of CXCL-16, GDF-15, PLA-2 in patients with cerebral infarction after effective treatment were monitored., Results: Compared with the healthy group, the expression levels of serum CXCL-16, GDF-15 and PLA-2 in the disease group were up-regulated ( P < 0.001). Patients with cerebral infarction were divided into subgroups according to the National Institutes of Health Neurological Impairment Score (NIHSS). The expression levels of serum CXCL-16, GDF-15 and PLA-2 in patients with cerebral infarction increased with the increase of the impairment score ( P < 0.001). The areas of the patient's cerebral infarction were calculated according to the Pullicino formula. The expression levels of serum CXCL-16, GDF-15 and PLA-2 in patients with cerebral infarction increased with the enlargement of the infarct area, and the difference between the groups was statistically significant ( P < 0.001). The expression levels of serum CXCL-16, GDF-15 and PLA-2 in patients with cerebral infarction when discharged from the hospital after treatment were significantly lower than those before treatment ( P < 0.001). The AUC areas of serum CXCL-16, GDF-15 and PLA-2 indicators in predicting the therapeutic effect of cerebral infarction were 0.821, 0.883, and 0.711, respectively., Conclusion: Serum CXCL-16, GDF-15, PLA-2 in patients with cerebral infarction were all highly expressed and changed with the disease severity, which can be used as reliable indicators for monitoring the incidence, severity, and prognosis of cerebral infarction., Competing Interests: None., (AJTR Copyright © 2021.)