Synthesis of nano-ceria powder of high thermal stability

A new method is studied for preparing nano-ceria by acid leaching MgO from CeO₂−MgO mixed powder made by calcining a gel. The MgO in the mixed powder can be leached completely with acetic acid solution at room temperature, but the CeO₂ remains unaffected. The surface area (Sg) of the resulting CeO₂ increases with Mg/Ce ratio, but approaches constant after the ratio is larger than a given value which is higher for the higher gel calcining temperature. When Mg/Ce is 8 (molar ratio) and the calcining temperature is 1253 K, the Sg of the resulting ceria remains 25.1 m²/g even after annealed at 1253 K for 4 h. In comparison with the conventional methods, CeO₂ from the new method shows higher surface area and higher thermal stability.     

Biodiversity and technological properties of yeasts from Turkish sourdough

Food Science and Biotechnology - In this study, yeasts were isolated and characterized from twelve traditional sourdough samples which belongs to Black Sea and Aegean regions of Turkey. Twenty six...     

Evaluating of traumatic brain injuries using artificial neural networks

The purpose of this study is to develop a diagnostic system to detect the severity of traumatic brain injuries using artificial neural networks. Three layered back propagation neural network with an input layer of 10 nodes whose output providing the inputs to a hidden layer was used. Thirty-two patients with traumatic brain injuries in different age and gender were taken in the study. Electroencephalography, Trauma and Glasgow coma scores were used for evaluating the data. The results obtained from the system were compared with the findings of neurologists. We found a significant relationship between the findings of neurologists and systems output for normal, mild, moderate and severe electroencephalography tracing data. Getting this system in routine use will lead to make a rapid decision for the degree of trauma with electroencephalography and revised trauma score.     

Separation and purification of hyaluronic acid by glucuronic acid imprinted microbeads

The purification of hyaluronic acid (HA) is relatively significant to use in biomedical applications. The structure of HA is formed by the repetitive units of glucuronic acid and N-acetyl glucosamine. In this study, glucuronic acid-imprinted microbeads have been supplied for the purification of HA from cell culture (Streptococcus equi). Histidine-functional monomer, methacryloylamidohistidine (MAH) was chosen as the metal-complexing monomer. The glucuronic acid-imprinted poly(ethyleneglycoldimethacrylate-MAH-Copper(II)) [p(EDMA-MAH-Cu²⁺)] microbeads have been synthesized by typical suspension polymerization procedure. The template glucuronic acid has been removed by employing 5 M methanolic KOH solution. p(EDMA-MAH-Cu²⁺) microbeads have been characterized by elemental analysis, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) images and swelling studies. Moreover, HA adsorption experiments have been performed in a batch experimental set-up. Purification of HA from cell culture supernatant has been also investigated by determining the hyaluronidase activity using purified HA as substrate. The glucuronic acid imprinted p(EDMA-MAH-Cu²⁺) particles can be used many times with no significant loss in adsorption capacities. Also, the selectivity of prepared molecular imprinted polymers (MIP) has been examined. Results have showed that MIP particles are 19 times more selective for glucuronic acid than N-acetylglucose amine.     

Early prostate cancer diagnosis by using artificial neural networks and support vector machines

The aim of this study is to design a classifier based expert system for early diagnosis of the organ in constraint phase to reach informed decision making without biopsy by using some selected features. The other purpose is to investigate a relationship between BMI (body mass index), smoking factor, and prostate cancer. The data used in this study were collected from 300 men (100: prostate adenocarcinoma, 200: chronic prostatism or benign prostatic hyperplasia). Weight, height, BMI, PSA (prostate specific antigen), Free PSA, age, prostate volume, density, smoking, systolic, diastolic, pulse, and Gleason score features were used and independent sample t-test was applied for feature selection. In order to classify related data, we have used following classifiers; scaled conjugate gradient (SCG), Broyden–Fletcher–Goldfarb–Shanno (BFGS), and Levenberg–Marquardt (LM) training algorithms of artificial neural networks (ANN) and linear, polynomial, and radial based kernel functions of support vector machine (SVM). It was determined that smoking is a factor increases the prostate cancer risk whereas BMI is not affected the prostate cancer. Since PSA, volume, density, and smoking features were to be statistically significant, they were chosen for classification. The proposed system was designed with polynomial based kernel function, which had the best performance (accuracy: 79%). In Turkish Family Health System, family physician to whom patients are applied firstly, would contribute to extract the risk map of illness and direct patients to correct treatments by using expert system such proposed.     

Coagulation of Particles Through Rapid Mixing

As is often assumed, rapid mix effectively distributes the dosed coagulant in suspension to promote subsequent flocculation of suspended particles and coagulant molecules. This study determined that the role of rapid mix is considerably more complex than conventionally assumed. Particles in the raw water samples from the Banxing Water Works of Taipei City were coagulated at high shear environment, during which flocs of size 40-70 μm were produced. The produced floc interior was compacted, and residual turbidity and the amount of dissolved natural organic matter (NOM) in suspension were substantially reduced. The subsequent stage of rapid mix slightly reduces floc size, further compacts the floc interior, and expels fine particles and some adsorbed NOM from the flocs. A sudden reduction in shearing rate produced large sized flocs with not so compact structures. Moreover, this action released fine particles from flocs into the suspension and enhanced adsorption of NOM onto solid surfaces.     

Partial purification of <Emphasis Type="Italic">nigella sativa</Emphasis> L. Seed lipase and its application in hydrolytic reactions. Enrichment of γ-linolenic acid from borage oil

Selective hydrolysis of borage (Borago officinalis L.) oil was catalyzed by two lipase preparations of Nigella sativa L. seeds at 40°C in a mixture of borage oil, water, and hexane. Ammonium sulfate-precipitated lipase (Nigella PL) and lipase partially purified by DEAE-ion exchange chromatography (Nigella CPL) exhibited a negative specificity toward γ-linolenic acid (GLA). Best results were obtained in the experiments conducted with 330 U/g oil of Nigella PL and 200 U/g oil of nigella CPL. When 330 U/g oil of Nigella PL was used, after 8 h the GLA level rose from 21.9% in the starting oil to 29.6 and 41.8% in TAG and DAG fractions of the product mixtures, respectively (1.5-fold enrichment of GLA in the total unhydrolyzed acylglycerol fraction). At 200 U/g oil enzyme concentration of Nigella CPL, after 77 h maximum GLA enrichment was observed in the DAG fraction. The GLA content of the DAG increased to 34.6%, corresponding to almost 1.6-fold enrichment. The relative inability of Nigella sativa lipase(s) to hydrolyze γ-linolenoyl moieties of TAG can be used for the enrichment of this acid in the unhydrolyzed acylglycerol fractions of GLA-containing oils.     

Effect of gamma irradiation on the properties of tyre cords

Gamma irradiation of high tenacity Nylon 6.6 (Ny 66) and polyester (PET) tyre cords was investigated. The untreated and treated tyre cords with different twist levels were irradiated at different dose rates in air. The effects of irradiation on both Ny 66 and PET cords were not found to be depending on the twist levels of the cords. The changes in the mechanical and thermal properties with absorbed dose at two different dose rates were measured. The mechanical properties were observed to deteriorate with increasing dose for Ny 66 cords, whereas remained almost unchanged for PET cords both in greige and dipped forms. Hot shrinkage value for the greige Ny 66 cords was found to be improved, i.e. decreased. This decrease was much lower for greige PET than Ny 66 cords. It is concluded that PET cord has higher radiation resistance than Ny 66 cord and the effects of high energy irradiation on tyre cords have to be taken into consideration during tyre design if pre-vulcanization with high energy radiation is to be applied.     

The Application of Critical Path Method (CPM) in Workflow Schema of Marble Processing Plants

The critical path method (CPM) is a widely applied technique in large-scale industrial project planning and control. Based on a detailed review of the current literature, no references have been found referring to the use of the CPM in marble processing plants and other industrial mineral plants. In this regard, this study proposes a new application area of CPM and suggests the implementation details of mineral processing workflows with particular emphasis on marble production facilities. In the study, the CPM is applied to marble processing plants for selecting an applicable production process and for determining the workflow schema in order to optimize the cost of operation and to effectively manage time. As a consequence of this analysis, a new production plan is proposed for medium-scale marble processing plants. A suitable marble processing plant has been built and taken into operation in accordance with the proposed plant plan. It has been observed that this plant has a higher production rate at a preferable capacity when compared to three other plants studied as a part of this research.