Risks related to car fire on innovative Poroelastic Road Surfaces—PERS

To reduce tyre/road noise, the concept of poroelastic road surfaces (PERS) was invented. PERS is a road surface material that is porous, and at the same time, it is flexible because of the substantial amount of rubber granulate content (from 20% to 85%). The rubber and stone particles are bound by polyurethane resin instead of bitumen. It was feared that in case of fire, because of the high content of rubber and polyurethane, there may be considerable emission of potentially hazardous substances (such as hydrogen cyanide) from burning PERS. Tests performed by the Technical University of Gdansk show that the emission of toxic gases is rather small and that the surface does not promote car fire, even when soaked with fuel. Car fire with fuel spill on PERS is less dangerous for passengers than car fire on dense road surface as the fire is spreading much slower. The article presents results of laboratory and road experiments carried out within FP7 ‘PERSUADE’. Copyright © 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Spectral properties of Eu(III) complexes with heteropolyanions immobilised in xerogel matrices

Eu³⁺ complexes with two heteropolymetalates (HPMs) were entrapped in various xerogel matrices by the sol-gel process. The spectral behaviour of these complexes in the rigid xerogel was studied by means of absorption and emission spectra. The luminescence emission experiments prove that photoexcitation of the HPM lattices (tungstate and molybdate) induced the energy transfer from the oxygen-to-metal charge transfer {O→M (= W, Mo)} triplet states to Eu³⁺ (⁷F_0,1,2→⁵D_0,1). Among the studied matrices with the Eu(III) complexes the best results, i.e. highest relative intensity and longest lifetime, were observed for methylated silicate (SiO₂-polydimethylsiloxane) and silica. In both the cases intensity of the emission could be improved by drying at elevated temperature. The studied materials consisting of complexes Eu³⁺ with the HPMs exhibit in practice stable emission intensity during UV irradiation.     

Electron transfer processes in photoinitiating systems composed of hemicyanine sec-butyltriphenylborate ion pairs

Summary Borate hemicyanine salts, namely sec-butyltriphenyl styrylbenzoxazole borates are shown to be effective photoinitiators for the polymerization of vinyl monomers. Mechanism of the photoinitiation involves sec-butyl radicals formed from the heterolytic cleavage of carbon-boron bond that follows the electron transfer process. The capability of the salts to act as initiators for the polymerization of multifunctional monomer is documented.     

Photocatalytic activity of anatase powders for oxidation of methylene blue in water and diluted NO gas

Two series of samples were prepared from titanium tetraisopropoxide (TTIP) through hydrolysis with different aging times, 10 min and 24 h, at room temperature and then annealed at different temperatures. Photocatalytic activities of these samples for methylene blue (MB) in water and for diluted NO gas were examined. For MB decomposition, rate constant k was determined from linear relation between logarithm of relative concentration of MB remained in water and UV irradiation time. For NO, its decomposition fraction after 10 h irradiation was determined. Difference in aging time gave different crystalline state of the precipitates, anatase phase with poor crystallinity after 10 min aging, but amorphous state after 24 h aging. These two precipitates showed different changes in crystallinity and in photoactivity for MB and NO with annealing temperature. Maximum rate constant k for MB decomposition was obtained at around 0.6° of full width at half maximum intensity (FWHM) of 101 diffraction line. For NO gas, a maximum decomposition fraction was obtained at FWHM of around 1.6°. Different crystallinity of anatase was shown to be required for the decomposition of MB in water and NO gas, high crystallinity of anatase phase for the former but poor crystallinity for the latter.     

Integrated crop–livestock–forestry systems: prospects for a sustainable agricultural intensification

In northwestern Germany slurry injection below maize (Zea mays L.) seeds is gaining increasing interest of farmers, because of the expected enhanced nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) use efficiencies compared to the usual fertilizing practice. The present study aims to compare the spatial and temporal soil mineral nitrogen (SMN) dynamics for these fertilizing strategies. Field trials with four treatments (unfertilized control, broadcast application + N P mineral starter fertilizer (+MSF), injection and injection + nitrification inhibitor (NI)) were conducted using pig slurry on sandy soil in 2014 and 2015. Soil samples were taken from three soil layers at 30 cm intervals down to 90 cm, and at three positions (below the maize row, 15 and 30 cm distance to the row) at several dates over the growing season. Soil monoliths (15 × 15 × 10 cm) were sampled around the injection zone, and for all other soil zones an auger was used. In 2014 due to heavy rainfall all fertilized N was displaced from the top soil layer of the broadcast treatment until 6-leaf stage, while N displacement was significantly smaller after slurry injection (about 20 kg SMN ha^?1 more in top layer). The lateral movement of injected slurry N was negligible. In 2015 almost no displacement of fertilized N out of the top soil layer occurred independently of treatments, because of lower rainfall. The release of slurry N was delayed following broadcast application and large SMN concentrations were detected in the injection zones until 10-leaf stage. The addition of a NI resulted in significantly increased ammonium N concentrations in the injection zone throughout the early growth stages [+46 % (2014) and +12 % (2015) at 6-leaf stage]. Thus, N displacement was delayed in 2014 and in 2015 at 6-leaf stage increased SMN concentrations (+1/3 with NI) were found around the slurry band. Due to slurry injection, especially when combined with a nitrification inhibitor, the applied nitrogen is located in a soil zone with better spatial availability for plant roots compared to broadcast application and the risk of nitrate leaching is significantly reduced.     

Functional lignin-SiO2 hybrids as potential fillers for phenolic binders

Functional lignin-SiO₂ hybrid fillers were synthesized and characterized with a view to their potential application in binders for phenolic resins. The properties of these fillers and of composites obtained from them with phenolic resin were compared with those of systems with lignin or silica alone. The chemical structure of the materials was investigated by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. Surface properties of lignin-SiO₂ fillers were tested using inverse gas chromatography (IGC). IGC was used for determination of surface energy and surface heterogeneity of the studied fillers. IGC made it possible to assess the adhesion between the tested fillers and phenolic resins. Interactions of functional fillers with phenolic resins were also evaluated by IGC. The results indicated that lignin-SiO₂ interacted strongly with the phenolic resin, more strongly than pure lignin. This was proved by SEM observations: thanks to the stronger interactions of lignin-SiO₂ hybrid with phenolic resins, a more homogeneous composite was obtained. Thermo-mechanical properties of lignin–silica and resin systems were investigated by DMTA. DMTA results showed that phenolic binders with lignin-SiO₂ fillers have better thermo-mechanical properties than systems with lignin or silica alone: higher glass transition temperature and a smaller decrease in storage modulus. Lignin fillers can thus provide new, promising properties for a phenolic binder combining the good properties of lignin as a plasticizer and of silica as a filler improving mechanical properties.     

An adaptive motion-compensated approach for video deinterlacing

Deinterlacing, defined as the process of converting a stream of interlaced frames into a sequence of progressive frames, represents a key feature in video processing. The interlaced video format, introduced by the old analog television transmission systems as a trade-off between framerate and bandwidth capacity, has become obsolete nowadays, when all transmissions are digital. Moreover, almost all recent displays??whether LCD or plasma??require progressive video input, whereas much of the available video content is in interlaced format. In this paper an adaptive, edge-preserving motion-compensated approach for video deinterlacing is proposed. The algorithm preserves strong edges and interpolates the missing pixels along the contours depending on the motion-degree of the region to which they belong. Our proposal is optimized to lower heavy computation, which is the main drawback of motion-compensated deinterlacing algorithms. Therefore it provides complexity scalability as a trade-off tool between performance and computation time. Experiments demonstrate a significant gain in reconstruction quality as compared to other deinterlacing implementations.     

Analysis of azaarenes in pan fried meat and its gravy by liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection

A method for analysis of six azaarenes (benzo[h]quinoline, benzo[a]acridine, benzo[c]acridine, dibenzo[a,c]acridine, dibenzo[a,j]acridine and dibenzo[a,h]acridine) in thermally treated high-protein food has been described. The clean-up procedure used based on alkaline hydrolysis, tandem solid phase extraction on columns filled with Extrelut – diatomaceous earth and cation exchanger (propyl sulfonic acid), enabled a selective isolation of carcinogenic compounds belonging to benzoacridines and dibenzoacridines from samples of cooked meat and its gravy. The isolated fractions of aza-PAHs were analysed by high-performance liquid chromatography with fluorescence detection. The detection limits for the azaarenes were between 0.0001 ng and 0.005 ng loaded on column. The recoveries for the four-ring and five-ring azaarenes were from 55% to 67%. Two types of dishes prepared from pork by pan-frying were investigated. Total contents of the benzoacridines and dibenzoacridines determined in cooked meat were 1.57 and 2.50 ng/g in collar and chop samples, respectively; their gravies contained 0.34 and 0.59 ng of these azaarenes per g of cooked meat.