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Purpose: This study aims to investigate determinants such as performance expectancy (PE), health beliefs (HB), technological compatibility, trust and social influence (SI) of customers' efforts to cope with problems associated with using wearable health technology, thereby determining their use intention of such products. The moderating effect of the demographic variables is also investigated. Design/methodology/approach: An online survey was used to collect panel data from 285 respondents in China. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypotheses, and interaction moderation was applied to test the moderating effect of the demographic variables. Findings: The results show that HB, technological compatibility, trust and SI significantly impact coping efforts associated with usage, which significantly influences intention to use. Only income significantly moderated the effect of coping efforts on the intention to use. Originality/value: This is the first study combining coping theory and UTAUT to develop a model of drivers that encourages customers to overcome the constraints of using wearable technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the field of biomass resource utilization, the steam explosion technology serves as the key technology to break the anti-degradation barrier of biomass and realize biorefineries, which is characteristic of clean, short-term and high efficiency. In this paper, the energy composition and transformation in the process of biomass steam explosion was analyzed using the basic principle of heat transfer, and an energy consumption model of biomass steam explosion was established to clarify the mechanical work of steam heat energy conversion and verify the consumption factors affecting the pretreatment enery of biomass steam explosion. It was shown that in the process of biomass steam explosion, the established model can not only accurately reflect the heat energy utilization and transformation process, but also quantitatively analyze the change law of material moisture content, steam explosion intensity and energy consumption of the charging amount. This study provides a theoretical reference for the steam explosion technology's application into the industrialization of biofuel or biorefineries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and terahertz time domain spectroscopy (THz-TDS) were employed to investigate the effects of steam-explosion on biomass, and the surface images, micro-analysis and terahertz spectra were obtained. SEM analysis of the surface showed that the parenchyma cell and epidermis of corn stem were smashed and separated by steam-explosion, which suggests a great increase in specific surface area and potentially enhanced speed of fermentation in the production of biogases and biofuels. Terahertz spectra of stover showed that their absorption coefficients increase with increasing frequency. Steam explosion may cause a subtle chemical change in biomass according to obviously different absorption coefficients between the steamed and original samples, which could also be proved by micro-analysis. Moreover, two resonance peaks were detected in the absorption curves of parenchyma cell, with notable frequency shift between curves of the steamed and original parenchyma cells. Assignments of the two vibrational peaks must be explored by further studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highly sensitive and low-cost electrocatalytic materials are of great importance for the commercial application of non-enzymatic glucose sensors. Herein, we fabricated a novel one-pot enzyme- and indicator-free method for the colorimetric sensing of blood glucose levels based on the direct redox reaction of β-MnO 2 /glucose. Owing to the introduction of ammonium acetate and the enhanced oxygen evolution reaction, the higher conductive β-MnO 2 nanosheets with the larger surface area were directly grown in situ on the conductive substrate by a linear sweep voltammetry (LSV) electrodeposition method. Besides, owing to the unique tunnel-type pyrolusite MnO 2 , the electrolyte diffusion was facilitated and reduced the response time in the glucose detection process. Hence, the acetate-assisted MnO 2 electrode exhibited a high sensitivity of 461.87 μA M -1 cm -2 toward glucose, a wide detection range from 1.0 μM to 1 mM, and a low detection limit of 0.47 μM while the electrode also maintained excellent selectivity and stability. These results clearly indicate that the new strategy we developed has great potential for practical applications., Competing Interests: There are no conflicts to declare., (This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry.)

High-concentration sugars production from stover is an important perspective technology for the cellulosic ethanol industrialization. Fed-batch process is an effective way to achieve this goal in the fermentation industry. In this study, based on fed-batch process, high-concentration sugars were produced from pretreated corn stover by enzymatic hydrolysis. After being pretreated by the dilute sulphuric acid, the impacts of the ratio of solid raw material to liquid culture, the content of supplementary materials and the refilling time on the saccharification rate were investigated. Results showed that the initial ratio of solid raw material to liquid culture was 20% (W/V) and the initial concentrations of enzymes for xylanase, cellulose and pectinase were 220 U, 6 FPU, and 50 U per gram of substrates, respectively. After 24 hours and 48 hours, 8% pretreated corn stovers were added respectively together with the additions of xylanase (20 U) and cellulose (2 FPU) per gram of substrates. After 72 hours, the final concentration of reducing sugar was increased to 138.5 g/L from 48.5 g/L of the non fed-batch process. The rate of enzyme hydrolysis of the raw material was 62.5% of the thoretical value in the fed-batch process. This study demonstrated that the fed-batch process could significantly improve the concentration of reducing sugar.