The use of nutshell carbons in drinking water filters for removal of chlorination by‐products

Chlorination of drinking water is a common practice, used by numerous municipalities in the United States (US) to safeguard their water supplies. However, the chlorine used can chemically react with organic components in the drinking water to produce unwanted chlorination by‐products. The objective of this investigation was to evaluate the use of granular activated carbon produced from nutshells (almond, English walnut, pecan) in a point‐of‐use (POU) water filtration system designated ‘Envirofilter’ and to determine its efficacy in removing select, potentially carcinogenic chlorination by‐products, namely the trihalomethanes (THMs) bromodichloromethane, bromoform and dibromochloromethane. The POU water filtration system that contained the nutshell‐based carbons was designated ‘Envirofilter’ and adsorption efficiencies of this system were compared to that of four commercially available POU home water filter systems, namely, BRITA, Omni Filter, PūR and Teledyne Water Pik. Eight different ‘Envirofilters’ were constructed of individual or binary mixtures of carbons produced from acid‐activated almond or pecan shells and steam‐activated pecan or walnut shells and evaluated for adsorption of the three chlorination by‐products. The results indicate that only two of the eight ‘Envirofilters’ failed to remove more THMs than the commercial POU systems. In both cases, these filters contained carbons with either 100% acid‐activated almond shells or 100% acid‐activated pecan shells. All six of the other filters contained carbons with either 50% or 100% steam‐activated pecan shells or steam‐activated walnut shells. Therefore, ‘Envirofilters’ appeared to depend on the presence of steam‐activated nutshell carbons for their success. The six effective ‘Envirofilters’ reduced THM levels to below the Maximum Contaminant Levels (MCL) required by the US Environmental Protection Agency (US EPA). Based on these results, these six ‘Envirofilters’ may be considered as a replacement for existing commercial filter systems because of their efficacy and projected cost. Copyright © 2004 Society of Chemical Industry     

Effects of gavage versus dosed feed administration on the toxicokinetics of benzyl acetate in rats and mice

8-epi-prostaglandin F2 alpha stimulated contraction of human myometrial strips obtained from five different donors at the time of hysterectomy with a pEC50 value of 6.3 +/- 0.5. In paired strips from the same donors the pEC50 value for the selective TP receptor agonist U46619 ([1R-[1a,4a,5b(Z),6a(1E,3S*)]]-7-[6-(3- hydroxy-1-octenyl)-2-oxabicyclo[2.2.1]hept-5-yl]-5-heptenoic acid) was 8.3 +/- 0.4. In strips from four other donors 8-epi-prostaglandin F2 alpha was ineffective whereas the pEC50 for U46619 was 6.9 +/- 0.3. Responses to 8-epi-prostaglandin F2 alpha were unaffected by the selective DP receptor antagonist BW A868C (3-benzyl-5-(6-carboxyhexyl)-1-(2- cyclohexyl-2-hydroxyethylamino)hydantoin) at 50 nM but were blocked by the selective TP receptor antagonist L670596 ((-)6,8-difluoro-9-p-methylsulfonyl benzyl-1,2,3,4- tetrahydrocarbazol-1-yl-acetic acid) at 50 nM. The pIC50 values obtained when the TP receptor antagonists GR 32191 ([1R- [1 alpha(Z),2 beta,3 beta,5 alpha]]-(+)-7-[5-[[(1,1'-biphenyl)-4- yl]methoxy]-3-hydroxy-2-(1-piperidinyl)cyclopentyl]-4-heptenoic acid), ICI D1542 ((4(Z)-6-[(2S,4S,5R)-2-[1-methyl-1-(2-nitro-4-tolyloxy)ethyl]- 4-(3-pyridyl)-1,3-dioxan-5-yl]hex-4-enoic acid), ICI 192605 (4(Z)-6-[(2,4,5-cis)-2-(2-chlorophenyl)-4-(2-hydroxyphenyl)-1,3- dioxan-5-yl]hexenoic acid), L670596 and SQ 29548 ([1S-(1 alpha,2 beta(5Z),3 beta,4 alpha]]-7- [3-[[2-[(phenylamino)carbonyl]hydrazino]methyl]-7- oxabicyclo[2.2.1]hept-2-yl]-5-heptenoic acid) were added cumulatively to strips pre-contracted with an EC80 concentration of 8-epi-prostaglandin F2 alpha were not significantly different from those obtained when an EC80 concentration of U46619 was used. The effects of 8-epi-prostaglandin F2 alpha on strips pre-contracted with an EC80 concentration of U46619 were not different from those of U46619 itself. It is concluded that in the non-pregnant human myometrium 8-epi-prostaglandin F2 alpha is a medium potency contractile agonist acting predominantly at the TP receptor.     

Force Curve Measurements with the AFM: Application to the In Situ Determination of Grafted Silicon-Wafer Surface Energies

The atomic force microscope (AFM) can be used to perform surface force measurements in the quasi-static mode (cantilever is not oscillating) to investigate nanoscale surface properties. Nevertheless, there is still a lack of literature proposing a complete systematic and rigorous experimental procedure that enables one to obtain reproducible and significant quantitative data. This article focuses on the fundamental experimental difficulties arising when making force curve measurements with the AFM in air. On the basis of this AFM calibration procedure, quantitative assessment values were used to determine, in situ, SAM (or Self Assembled Monolayer)-tip thermodynamic work of adhesion at a local scale, which have been found to be in good agreement with quoted values. Finally, determination of surface energies of functionalised silicon wafers (as received, CH₃, OH functionalised silicon wafers) with the AFM (at a local scale) is also proposed and compared with the values obtained by wettability (at a macroscopic scale). In particular, the effect of the capillary forces is discussed.     

Overlay Cognitive Radio Based on OFDM with Channel Estimation Issues

Wireless Personal Communications - Cognitive radio (CR) has been proposed as a technology to improve the spectrum efficiency by giving an opportunistic access of the licensed-user spectra to...     

Quality evaluation of fish and other seafood by traditional and nondestructive instrumental methods: Advantages and limitations

Although being one of the most vulnerable and perishable products, fish and other seafoods provide a wide range of health-promoting compounds. Recently, the growing interest of consumers in food quality and safety issues has contributed to the increasing demand for sensitive and rapid analytical technologies. Several traditional physicochemical, textural, sensory, and electrical methods have been used to evaluate freshness and authentication of fish and other seafood products. Despite the importance of these standard methods, they are expensive and time-consuming, and often susceptible to large sources of variation. Recently, spectroscopic methods and other emerging techniques have shown great potential due to speed of analysis, minimal sample preparation, high repeatability, low cost, and, most of all, the fact that these techniques are noninvasive and nondestructive and, therefore, could be applied to any online monitoring system. This review describes firstly and briefly the basic principles of multivariate data analysis, followed by the most commonly traditional methods used for the determination of the freshness and authenticity of fish and other seafood products. A special focus is put on the use of rapid and nondestructive techniques (spectroscopic techniques and instrumental sensors) to address several issues related to the quality of these products. Moreover, the advantages and limitations of each technique are reviewed and some perspectives are also given.     

Assess deep learning models for Egyptian exchange prediction using nonlinear artificial neural networks

Neural Computing and Applications - Financial analysis of the stock market using the historical data is the exigent demand in business and academia. This work explores the efficiency of three deep...     

Design of parallel fault-secure encoders for systematic cyclic block transmission codes

In this paper, we consider the problem of designing parallel fault-secure encoders for various systematic cyclic linear codes used in data transmission. It is assumed that the data to be encoded before transmission are stored in a fault-tolerant RAM memory system protected against errors using a cyclic linear error detecting and/or correcting code. The main idea relies on taking advantage of the RAM check bits to control the correct operation of the cyclic code encoder as well. A slightly modified encoder allows not only for encoding the transmission data stream but also, independently and in parallel, to generate the reference check bits which allow for concurrent error detection in the encoder itself. The error detection capacity proves to be effective and grants good levels of protection as shown by error injection campaigns on encoders for various standard linear cyclic error detecting and error correcting codes. Moreover, the complexity evaluation of the FPGA implementations of the encoders shows that their fault-secure versions compare favorably against the unprotected ones, both with respect to hardware complexity and the maximal frequency of operation.     

Electrochemical and Spectroscopic Study on the Corrosion of Ti–5Al and Ti–5Al–5Cu in Chloride Solutions

Metals and Materials International - In this study, manufacturing of Ti–5Al and Ti–5Al–5Cu alloys were accomplished employing mechanical alloying technique. The corrosion...