Improved production of ginsenosides in suspension cultures of ginseng by medium replenishment strategy

The objective of this study was to improve the accumulation of ginsenosides by the adventitious root cultures of ginseng, which are important secondary metabolites with pharmaceutical applications. The adventitious roots were cultured in bioreactors for 50 d using 1.5-strength Murashige and Skoog (MS) medium supplemented with 10 mg/l indole acetic acid and 75 g/l sucrose. Kinetic studies of the nutrient composition of the spent medium revealed the gradual depletion of various inorganic nutrients and sugars. Cultures were supplied with fresh nutrient medium (medium exchange or replenishment with 0.75- and 1.0-strength MS medium) after 10 and 20 d of culture initiation to fulfill the nutritional requirements of adventitious roots. Medium replenishment strategy (with 1.0-strength MS medium after 20 d of culture) significantly improved the growth of adventitious roots and the biosynthesis of ginsenosides by the adventitious roots. This work is useful for the large-scale cultivation of adventitious roots for the production of ginsenosides.     

Thermal Stability of the Pigments Hydroxysafflor Yellow A, Safflor Yellow B, and Precarthamin from Safflower (Carthamus tinctorius)

ABSTRACT Three major yellow pigments were isolated from safflower petals ( Carthamus tinctorius ) and characterized as hydroxysafflor yellow A (1), safflor yellow B (2), and precarthamin (3) by ¹H-NMR, ¹H-¹H COSY, ¹³C-NMR, HMQC, and HMBC spectral analysis. Thermal degradation reactions of 3 yellow pigments 1 to 3 at temperatures of 70 to 90 °C were carried out at different pH levels within the range of 3.0 to 10.0 by UV-vis spectral measurements. First-order reaction kinetics was observed for the degradation of safflower yellow pigments (1 to 3) at pH 3.0 and 5.0. Activation energies of thermal degradation of 1-3 at pH 5.0 were calculated as 17.0, 15.4, and 20.1 kcal/mol, respectively. At neutral and alkaline conditions, yellow pigments 1-3 did not follow simple first-order kinetics.     

A Nonlinear Structure Tensor with the Diffusivity Matrix Composed of the Image Gradient

We propose a nonlinear partial differential equation (PDE) for regularizing a tensor which contains the first derivative information of an image such as strength of edges and a direction of the gradient of the image. Unlike a typical diffusivity matrix which consists of derivatives of a tensor data, we propose a diffusivity matrix which consists of the tensor data itself, i.e., derivatives of an image. This allows directional smoothing for the tensor along edges which are not in the tensor but in the image. That is, a tensor in the proposed PDE is diffused fast along edges of an image but slowly across them. Since we have a regularized tensor which properly represents the first derivative information of an image, the tensor is useful to improve the quality of image denoising, image enhancement, corner detection, and ramp preserving denoising. We also prove the uniqueness and existence of solution to the proposed PDE.     

Flexibility as a source of value in the production of alternative fuels: The ethanol case

There is typically a high degree of flexibility associated with the production of alternative fuels due to the ability to source from different input raw materials or to produce different output products based on market conditions. In this paper, we consider the particular example of ethanol and seek to quantify the incremental value from flexibility in its production from sugarcane in Brazil. We accomplish this by first jointly modeling the stochastic processes for the prices of the two relevant commodities, sugar (a food commodity) and ethanol (an energy commodity) in discrete time as a bivariate lattice. This framework allows us to value the option to switch output products based on the respective price signals of the two commodities. However, unlike the usual assumption of geometric Brownian motion stochastic processes, we use the more realistic case of mean reverting commodity price processes. We estimate the parameters for these processes by applying a regression-based procedure to empirical sugar and ethanol data collected during a period from 1998 through 2008. Our results show that the option to switch outputs has significant value, even under the assumption of mean reverting prices, which has implications for both producers and policy-makers alike.     

Calculation of leak sizes in pressurised vessels and pipes according to the leak-before-break criterion

For the consideration of released mass flows and their effects within hazard studies, leakage areas need to be determined which are physically justifiable and which cannot be reasonably excluded. Applying the fracture mechanics the leak-before-break behaviour is verified by the calculation of the propagation of an initial material defect. Consequently, leakage areas of through-cracks are calculated to determine probable and maximum leakage areas. For this purpose, models for the calculation of leak sizes are compared and evaluated. Example calculations are stated for typical pressurised vessels and pipes of the chemical industry in order to check the present estimates of leakage areas. In addition, measures supporting the leak-before-break behaviour are outlined.     

A-sign und a.trust bündeln Aktivitäten

AktuellDivitec Metal

Aufbereitung von Elektro(nik)-Altger?ten     

Spatiospectral transmission of a plane-mirror Fabry-Perot interferometer with nonuniform finite-size diffraction beam illuminations

The transmission of a plane-mirror Fabry-Perot (PFP) interferometer is theoretically modeled and investigated by treating the spatial and spectral features in a unified manner. A spatiospectral transfer function is formulated and utilized to describe the beam propagation and the multiple-beam interference occurring in an ideal one-dimensional strip PFP interferometer with no diffraction loss. The spatial-frequency filtration of a finite-size beam input not only determines the transmitted spatial beam profile but also plays a crucial role in affecting the overall spectral transmittance. The inherent deviations of the spectral transmittance from what we know as the standard Airy's formula are revealed in diverse aspects, including the less-than-unity peak transmittance, the displacement of a resonance peak frequency, and the asymmetric detuning profile. Our theoretical analysis extends to the misaligned PFP interferometers, such as the cases in which non-normal-incidence beams or wedge-aligned mirrors are used that could severely degrade the effective interferometer finesse.     

Reduction of stable differential–algebraic equation systems via projections and system identification

Most large-scale process models derived from first principles are represented by nonlinear differential–algebraic equation (DAE) systems. Since such models are often computationally too expensive for real-time control, techniques for model reduction of these systems need to be investigated. However, models of DAE type have received little attention in the literature on nonlinear model reduction. In order to address this, a new technique for reducing nonlinear DAE systems is presented in this work. This method reduces the order of the differential equations as well as the number and complexity of the algebraic equations. Additionally, the algebraic equations of the resulting system can be replaced by an explicit expression for the algebraic variables such as a feedforward neural network. This last property is important insofar as the reduced model does not require a DAE solver for its solution but system trajectories can instead be computed with regular ODE solvers. This technique is illustrated with a case study where responses of several different reduced-order models of a distillation column with 32 differential equations and 32 algebraic equations are compared.     

Advanced photospacers with elastic recovery

A new series of photospacers has been prepared with different types of crosslinkers to improve elastic recovery. Afunctional crosslinker with six reactive groups demonstrates the best elastic recovery. As the quantity of crosslinker is increased, the elastic recovery also increases, probably due to an increase in the crosslinking density. The use of ADMS EPS® results in high resolution, good uniformity, and high production yield in the liquid‐crystal‐display (LCD) process. Especially, EPS® improves and solves problems such as viewing angle, crosstalk, and dark spots.     

Mathematical modeling of the reduction process of iron ore particles in two stages of twin-fluidized beds connected in series

A mathematical model is presented to describe the reduction process of iron ore particles in two stages of twin-fluidized beds (TFBs) connected in series: prereduction and final reduction stages. Main features of the model are the inclusion of particle degradation phenomenon to account for its effect on reduction of iron oxides and reduction kinetics for multiparticles having a wide size distribution. It was found that about 90 pct of overall particle degradation occurs in the prereduction stage mainly due to thermal stress and volume expansion. The reduction degree of particles larger than 1 mm decreased fast with increasing particle size in both the prereduction and final reduction stages. However, the particles sized between 0.2 and 1 mm showed mild increase in reduction degree, and steep increase for the fines smaller than 0.2 mm. The reduction degree was also gradually decreased with increasing the gas oxidation degree of feed gas in both the prereduction and final reduction stages. It was found that to obtain a desired reduction degree, it is of great importance to control the bed temperature in stage I rather than in stage II. The optimum range of residence time was 15 to 20 minutes in the prereduction stage and 30 to 35 minutes in the final reduction stage.