Enzyme activity and partial characterization of proteases obtained from Bromelia karatas fruit and compared with Bromelia pinguin proteases

Food Science and Biotechnology - The enzymatic activity and partial characterization of proteases from Bromelia karatas fruits were evaluated and compared with Bromelia pinguin proteases. The...     

LNG冷量优化集成利用技术

我国将相继在沿海地区建成多个LNG接收站，每年将进口数以千万吨计的LNG，同时携带数着巨额冷量，而这些冷量可用于发电、空气分离、制造干冰、低温冷库等众多领域。基于国外LNG冷量利用现状，指出我国即将展开和实施此项技术还存在着：过程火用损较大，缺乏系统、全面的LNG冷量利用技术的研发指导机制，以及宏观调控力度薄弱等问题，进而提出了发展LNG冷量的集成利用方案，可为此类技术的研发利用提供新思路。以福建即将进口的LNG为例，模拟了空气分离与干冰制备的集成工艺流程，结果表明：福建每年进口的260×10⁴t LNG可以冷却290×10⁴t空气，相当于60000 m³/h的氧气制备规模，还可以生产100×10⁴t的干冰，其过程火用损较小；其剩余的高温位冷量可应用于低温冻结库或冰灯等项目，这对主体装置的实施效果和过程火用损的影响较小。该技术的优点在于可灵活控制冷却空气的液化率，基本不用冷却循环水，流程简单，设备投资少，能耗低等。     

Night and Day: Are Siblings as Different in Temperament as Parents Say They Are?

Twin studies suggest that parent ratings of temperament exaggerate differences between twins. The present study examined whether such contrast effects also operate for nontwin siblings. The activity level (AL) and shyness of 95 nontwin sibling pairs (ages 3 to 8 years) were assessed via parent ratings and objective measures (actigraph and observer ratings). Siblings showed no resemblance in either parent-rated AL or shyness; however, sibling resemblance for actigraph AL and observer-rated shyness was substantial. Thus, parents do contrast their nontwin siblings when rating these 2 temperament dimensions. Moreover, the importance of sibling differences in temperament to the sibling relationship and differential maternal treatment varied across the different measures of AL and shyness, suggesting that parent perceptions may play a role in these associations. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Assay of oral vaccination of dogs against rabies in Tunisia with the vaccinal strain SADBern

The possibility of immunizing dogs orally against rabies, using SADBern, an attenuated strain, was tested on dogs in the field in Tunisia. This strain induced high neutralizing antibody titres and conferred to all vaccinated dogs total resistance against a challenge with a Maghrebian strain. However, an excretion of virus of vaccinal origin was observed in one dog, hampering the use of SADBern in dogs. Nevertheless, this work demonstrates for the first time that dogs in developing countries, especially those which are inaccessible to parenteral vaccination, could be efficiently immunized against rabies by the oral route.     

基于过程能量综合优化的延迟焦化装置扩大生产能力改造策略

根据延迟焦化流程的特点，分析了延迟焦化装置扩大生产能力的瓶颈，探讨了基于能量综合优化的装置扩能解除瓶颈的策略方法，基于过程能量综合优化，运用流程模拟技术，通过配套的加热炉优化，分馏塔操作优化，换热网络柔性设计等手段，实现了装置扩大生产能力的目的，并运用所提出的策略对某延迟焦化装置进行了基于能量系统优化的扩能改造，在原流程与设备的基础上，装置处理量增大18．2％，装置物耗，能耗大幅度降低，改造设备投资少，说明能量综合优化对工艺装置扩能改造具有重要意义。     

A new boundary finite element method for fluid–structure interaction problems

In order to study problems on fluid–structure interaction, we have used a mixed formulation which couples the classical functional of the structure with a new variational formulation by integral equations for the fluid. This formulation has the advantage over the finite element methods of avoiding the discretization of the fluid domain. Furthermore, unlike collocation methods, the explicit calculation of the Hadamard finite part of the singular integrals is avoided. This leads after discretization by boundary finite elements to a small and symmetrical algebraic system. Typical examples are presented that demonstrate the efficiency of this variational formulation by studying the sound transmission through a baffled plane structure and through a flexible panel backed by a rigid cavity. These include the calculation of the transmission loss factor and the determination of which modes dominate the noise transmission. Good agreement is obtained between numerical results and analytical results found in the literature.     

A comparative study of distributed frequency assignment algorithms for wireless sensor networks

Wireless sensor networks are composed of energy constrained nodes embedding limited transmission, processing and sensing capabilities. The main research efforts in this area sought to prolong the network lifetime by reducing energy consumption of network operations. Data gathering mechanisms such as clustering have been shown to achieve significant energy savings. However, such benefits can be obtained only if neighboring clusters operate on different frequencies (channels). As the salient characteristics of wireless sensor networks favor a distributed approach, we analyze the performance of several distributed frequency assignment algorithms with a focus on energy consumption. In this context, we find that a heuristic may achieve better results than backtracking-based algorithms.     

Elimination of organic matter present in wastewaters from the cork industry by membrane filtration

BACKGROUND: The first stage of the cork industrial process generates great volumes of wastewater with moderate to high organic pollutant content that must be purified using different procedures, such as filtration by membranes. RESULTS: The tangential filtration of these wastewaters was studied using two different laboratory equipments. In the first one, three ultrafiltration (UF) membranes were tested, with molecular weight cut‐off (MWCO) 100 kDa and 30 kDa, and two operating modes were used: total recycling of permeate and retentate streams, and in continuous mode, without recycling both streams. In the total recycling UF experiments, the influence of the operating variables on the permeate flux was first established. The effectiveness of the different membranes was determined by evaluating the rejection coefficients for several parameters that measure the global pollutant content of the effluent. The values found for these rejection coefficients were in the following order: ellagic acid and color > absorbance at 254 nm > tannic content > COD (chemical oxygen demand). In the continuous mode experiments, the fouling mechanism for each membrane was established by fitting the experimental data to various filtration fouling models given in the literature. The operating mode in the second equipment was batch concentration, and additional experiments were carried out with an UF membrane (2 kDa), and with a NF membrane (with MWCO in the range 150–300 Da). CONCLUSIONS: The three operating modes tested provided different rejection levels of organic matter; among them, the most effective procedure tested was batch concentration mode using a NF membrane. Copyright © 2007 Society of Chemical Industry     

Study of hot air generator with quasi-uniform temperature using concentrated solar radiation: Influence of the shape parameters

The non-uniformity of the air temperatures and the slow flow rate at the plane collector exit constitute the main cause of the limitations of the solar drying systems. In order to obtain an uniform and a variable flow rate for different uses, a hot air generator using concentrated solar radiation is proposed. To improve the thermal efficiency of the generator, a study of the influence of different shape parameters is realized. The generator is simulated in the laboratory while investigating the flow induced by a circular disc heated uniformly by Joule effect at constant temperature. This disc is placed at the entrance of an open ended vertical cylinder of a larger diameter. Thermal radiation emitted by the hot disc heats the cylinder wall. The heating of the fluid at the cylinder-inlet generates a thermosiphon flow around the one created by the hot disc. The comparison of the velocity and the temperature profiles of the resulting flow permits to determine the influence of the cylinder height, the vertical source-cylinder spacing and the radius ratio, on the resulting flow at the system exit. Thus, a judicious choice of the shape parameters entails an improvement of the flow rate as well as the thermal flux absorbed by the air and a good homogenization of the air temperature at the generator exit.     

Facility layout problems: A survey

Layout problems are found in several types of manufacturing systems. Typically, layout problems are related to the location of facilities (e.g., machines, departments) in a plant. They are known to greatly impact the system performance. Most of these problems are NP hard. Numerous research works related to facility layout have been published. A few literature reviews exist, but they are not recent or are restricted to certain specific aspects of these problems. The literature analysis given here is recent and not restricted to specific considerations about layout design.

We suggest a general framework to analyze the literature and present existing works using such criteria as: the manufacturing system features, static/dynamic considerations, continual/discrete representation, problem formulation, and resolution approach. Several research directions are pointed out and discussed in our conclusion.