How do the plants used in phytoremediation in constructed wetlands,a sustainable remediation strategy,perform in heavy‐metal‐contaminated mine sites?

This review draws on knowledge for the treatment of heavy‐metal leachate in contaminated mine sites. Mine waste rock dumps and tailings generate a continuous stream of metalliferous and saline leachate over the long term. The mining industry has many legacy sites, which have compromised aquatic ecosystems and groundwater because of heavy‐metal contamination. Chemical and engineering methods are available and have been extensively utilised. However, these methods require intensive energy and often produce substantial volumes of secondary waste. We therefore argue in favour of phytoremediation as a sustainable remediation strategy leading towards efficient and sustainable metal removal and immobilisation through constructed wetlands.     

Novel aromatic macrocyclic oligomers: intermediates for the preparation of high-performance polymers

Recent studies aimed at the development of macrocyclic oligomers as the intermediates for the preparation of high-performance polymers are reviewed. Efficient methods for the preparation of a range of cyclic oligomers, such as aryl ether ketones, aryl ether phthalazines, aryl ether isoquinolines, aryl ether phthalazinones, and arylene sulfides, have been developed. Cyclization was achieved via a nucleophilic aromatic substitution reaction under high-dilution conditions. The cyclic aryl ether oligomers undergo a facile ring-opening polymerization to form high molecular weight polymer. Cyclic oligomers containing an aromatic sulfide linkage also undergo a facile free-radical ring-opening polymerization to form high molecular weight polymers which can be amorphous or crystalline. Due to their low molecular weights, these cyclic oligomers have very low melt viscosities which makes them attractive intermediates for a variety of applications for which the conventionally prepared high molecular weight polymers would not be suitable.     

Flux measurements for a DD neutron generator using neutron activation analysis

The fast and maximum thermal neutron fluxes from the DD-109 neutron generator at the University of Sharjah were experimentally measured by the activation technique using different neutron reactions. The thermal and fast neutron fluxes were found to be 2.960 × 10~6 and6.186 × 10~7 n/cm~2 s, respectively. This was done to verify the modeling results for the optimum moderator thickness needed to maximize the thermal neutron flux. The optimum moderator thickness was found to be between 3.5 and4 cm. The present data were compared with the detailed MCNP model-based calculation performed in earlier work to simulate the generator.     

Mundane aesthetics.

With the publication of Zür experimentalen ?sthetik (1871) and Vorschule der ?sthetik (1876), Fechner laid the foundations for a new field termed experimental aesthetics, and provided three methods for empirical research. Of these, the method of choice has dominated subsequent research. It is argued that this method, in combination with a narrow, post-Baumgarten definition of aesthetics as pertaining mainly to the experience of art, has not served aesthetics well. In so doing it has overlooked the vast corpus of everyday objects for which people engage in aesthetic choice. Termed mundane aesthetics, this represents the low end, design, as distinct from the high end, art. The aesthetics of the mundane represents everyday reality, far removed from the rarefied pursuit of art. A study is reported into that most mundane and ubiquitous activity, selecting a paint color for the home. It eschews the laboratory and, instead, uses a retrospective method supported by qualitative data analysis (NVivo). The results indicate that aesthetic choice involves processes that are far from uniform, far from instantaneous (cf. laboratory studies), and that employ both internal and external aids reflecting cognitive, emotional, and social considerations. Selecting a wall color emerges as a surprisingly sophisticated process and, on the basis of the present study, one that women appear better equipped to perform than men. A parallel is drawn with the domain of decision research, particularly naturalistic decision-making. Mundane aesthetics involves a decision process, and not simply an affective choice. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

Atomic force microscopy as a nanoscience tool in rational food design

Atomic force microscopy (AFM) is a nanoscience tool that has been used to provide new information on the molecular structure of food materials. As an imaging tool it has led to solutions to previously intractable problems in food science. This type of information can provide a basis for tailoring food structures to optimise functional behaviour. Such an approach will be illustrated by indicating how a basic understanding of the role of interfacial stability in complex foods systems can be extended to understand how such interfacial structures behave on digestion, and how this in turn suggests routes for the rational design of processed food structures to modify lipolysis and control fat intake. As a force transducer AFM can be used to probe interactions between food structures such as emulsion droplets at the colloidal level. This use of force spectroscopy will be illustrated through showing how it allows the effect of the structural modification of interfacial structures on colloidal interactions to be probed in model emulsion systems. Direct studies on interactions between colliding soft, deformable droplets reveal new types of interactions unique to deformable particles that can be exploited to manipulate the behaviour of processed or natural emulsion structures involved in digestion processes. Force spectroscopy can be adapted to probe specific intermolecular interactions, and this application of the technique will be illustrated through its use to test molecular hypotheses for the bioactivity of modified pectin molecules. Copyright © 2011 Society of Chemical Industry     

The mountain bike — the dream machine?

This paper examines the development of recreation on mountain bikes, since they were introduced in 1983. It considers some of the social conflicts that have reportedly arisen and then presents the results of a user survey undertaken in 1992. This provides a profile of mountain bike use and users. The aim of the study is to provide landscape managers, planners etc., with basic information about this latest form of countryside recreation so as to encourage more effective provision and management.     

A role for whey-derived lactoferrin and immunoglobulins in the attenuation of obesity-related inflammation and disease

Obesity is a strong predictive factor in the development of chronic disease and has now superseded undernutrition as a major public health issue. Chronic inflammation is one mechanism thought to link excess body weight with disease. Increasingly, the gut and its extensive population of commensal microflora are recognized as playing an important role in the development of obesity-related chronic inflammation. Obesity and a high fat diet are associated with altered commensal microbial communities and increased intestinal permeability which contributes to systemic inflammation as a result of the translocation of lipopolysaccharide into the circulation and metabolic endotoxemia. Various milk proteins are showing promise in the prevention and treatment of obesity and chronic low-grade inflammation via reductions in visceral fat, neutralization of bacteria at the mucosa and reduced intestinal permeability. In this review, we focus on evidence supporting the potential antiobesogenic and anti-inflammatory effects of bovine whey-derived lactoferrin and immunoglobulins.     

First-Principles Calculation of the Third Virial Coefficient of Helium

Knowledge of the pair and three-body potential-energy surfaces of helium is now sufficient to allow calculation of the third density virial coefficient, C(T), with significantly smaller uncertainty than that of existing experimental data. In this work, we employ the best available pair and three-body potentials for helium and calculate C(T) with path-integral Monte Carlo (PIMC) calculations supplemented by semiclassical calculations. The values of C(T) presented extend from 24.5561 K to 10 000 K. In the important metrological range of temperatures near 273.16 K, our uncertainties are smaller than the best experimental results by approximately an order of magnitude, and the reduction in uncertainty at other temperatures is at least as great. For convenience in calculation of C(T) and its derivatives, a simple correlating equation is presented.