Chemisches Recycling für Kunststoffe: Status und Perspektiven

The mechanical recycling of plastics has been established on an industrial scale for years but has technical and economic limits. Chemical recycling processes lead back to monomers or to the raw materials, so that in the end new goods can be produced for all areas of application of plastics. The variety of chemical recycling processes is large. The capacities of the plants are still low today and the profitability is strongly influenced by the oil price. The profitability limit is currently between 50 and 60 US $ per barrel.     

Age-Dependent Control of Collagen-Dependent Platelet Responses by Thrombospondin-1—Comparative Analysis of Platelets from Neonates,Children, Adolescents,and Adults

Platelet function is developmentally regulated. Healthy neonates do not spontaneously bleed, but their platelets are hypo-reactive to several agonists. The mechanisms underlying immature platelet function in neonates are incompletely understood. This critical issue remains challenging for the establishment of age-specific reference ranges. In this study, we evaluated platelet reactivity of five pediatric age categories, ranging from healthy full-term neonates up to adolescents (11–18 years) in comparison to healthy adults (>18 years) by flow cytometry. We confirmed that platelet hypo-reactivity detected by fibrinogen binding, P-selectin, and CD63 surface expression was most pronounced in neonates compared to other pediatric age groups. However, maturation of platelet responsiveness varied with age, agonist, and activation marker. In contrast to TRAP and ADP, collagen-induced platelet activation was nearly absent in neonates. Granule secretion markedly remained impaired at least up to 10 years of age compared to adults. We show for the first time that neonatal platelets are deficient in thrombospondin-1, and exogenous platelet-derived thrombospondin-1 allows platelet responsiveness to collagen. Platelets from all pediatric age groups normally responded to the C-terminal thrombospondin-1 peptide RFYVVMWK. Thus, thrombospondin-1 deficiency of neonatal platelets might contribute to the relatively impaired response to collagen, and platelet-derived thrombospondin-1 may control distinct collagen-induced platelet responses.     

Myxococcus xanthus as Host for the Production of Benzoxazoles

Benzoxazoles are important structural motifs in pharmaceutical drugs. Here, we present the heterologous production of 3-hydroxyanthranilate-derived benzoxazoles in the host bacterium Myxococcus xanthus following the expression of two genes from the nataxazole biosynthetic gene cluster of Streptomyces sp. Tü 6176. The M. xanthus expression strain achieved a benzoxazole titer of 114.6±7.4 mg L⁻¹ upon precursor supplementation, which is superior to other bacterial production systems. Crosstalk between the heterologously expressed benzoxazole pathway and the endogenous myxochelin pathway led to the combinatorial biosynthesis of benzoxazoles featuring a 2,3-dihydroxybenzoic acid (2,3-DHBA) building block. Subsequent in vitro studies confirmed that this crosstalk is not only due to the availability of 2,3-DHBA in M. xanthus, rather, it is promoted by the adenylating enzyme MxcE from the myxochelin pathway, which contributes to the activation of aryl carboxylic acids and delivers them to benzoxazole biosynthesis.     

Proposal for a Revised Reference Concentration (RfC) for mercury vapour in adults

Worldwide, approximately 30-50 millions of people are living in small scale gold mining areas and are primarily burdened by mercury vapour.In the frame of our study, 306 mercury (Hg) vapour burdened adults, working and/ or living in two small scale gold mining areas in Zimbabwe and Tanzania and 58 volunteers from near-by unburdened communities were medically investigated. In addition, blood, urine and hair samples from each participant were analyzed for mercury. Altogether, 26 anamnestic and 24 clinical signs and symptoms, which may be caused by Hg vapour, were evaluated. Multivariate analysis was performed to investigate the influence of the mercury concentration in the bio-monitors on the evaluated anamnestic and clinical signs and symptoms taking into account age, gender, health status, alcohol consumption, use of pesticides and gasoline sniffing.Out of the resulting correlations between concentration and effect, ROC-curves were calculated to determine best estimates of the cut-off-values in the bio monitors. For the parameters ataxia of gait and sadness cut-off-values of 4.7 and 3.6 µg Hg/g crea in urine were calculated. These values were converted to a rounded LOAEL of 3.5 µg Hg vapour/m³ air. In analogy to the US EPA Report (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 1997) and the European Position Paper (Pirrone et al. 2001), uncertainty factors of 30 and 50 were applied, resulting in a proposed reference concentration (RfC) in ambient air of 0.1 µg Hg vapour/m³ and 0.07 µg Hg vapour/m³, respectively.