The Impact of Fluid Dynamic Stress in Stirred Bioreactors – The Scale of the Biological Entity: A Personal View

From the start of industrial biotechnology, there has been a perception that biological entities are damaged by stirring, so-called ‘shear damage'. Often, it was the soft option to explain a loss of performance when it was due to other factors, such as bubble ingestion with proteins or on scale-up, where tip speed increased when it was due to decreased homogeneity, especially in pH. For many years, poor control and the range of analytical tools available made a more in-depth explanation difficult; and the concepts of ‘high' and ‘low shear' impellers, now largely disproven, increased it. Here, the size of the biological entity is compared to the Kolmogorov microscale of turbulence leading to a reasonably clear picture emerging. The article starts with the author's introduction to the issue approximately 42 year ago with enzymes, conveniently also the smallest entity; and finishes with the largest, filamentous fungi.     

等径角挤压法制备超细晶的研究现状

总结了等径角挤压(Equal Channel Angular Pressing，ECAP)过程中的影响因素、晶粒细化的机理等方面的研究进展，讨论了挤压温度、挤压速度在ECAP过程中对材料的影响，简述了ECAP的变形途径、变形次数对材料晶粒、材料变形量的影响。论述了由等径角挤压方法制备超细晶材料的发展现状并提出了一些需要进一步深入研究的方面。     

小型轴类零件切断、冷镦、自动送料连续模

介绍了用在通用压力机上成形小型轴类零件的一种新型切断、冷镦自动送料连续模的结构形式、工作原理和设计要点。并给出了实用的模具结构。     

Chip geometries during high-speed machining for orthogonal cutting conditions

The originality of this work consists in taking photographs of chips during the cutting process for a large range of speeds. Contrary to methods usually used such as the quick stop in which root chips are analyzed after an abrupt interruption of the cutting, the proposed process photographs the chip geometry during its elaboration. An original device reproducing perfectly orthogonal cutting conditions is used because it allows a good accessibility to the zone of machining and reduces considerably the vibrations found in conventional machining tests. A large range of cutting velocities is investigated (from 17 to 60 m/s) for a middle hard steel (French Standards XC18). The experimental measures of the root chip geometry, more specifically the tool-chip contact length and the shear angle, are obtained from an analysis of the pictures obtained with a numerical high-speed camera. These geometrical characteristics of chips are studied for various cutting speeds, at the three rake angles −5, 0, +5° and for different depths of cut reaching 0.65 mm.     

基于光谱和时相特征的夏玉米遥感识别

精确提取作物种植面积一直是农业遥感关注的主要问题之一。综合运用低分辨率的时相变化特征和中分辨率的光谱特征,提出一种夏玉米识别方法。首先基于MODIS NDVI时间序列曲线,分析夏玉米在时相变化上的识别特征,构建识别模型。夏玉米纯像元利用识别模型识别,而耕地和非耕地类型的植被产生的混合像元,则基于像元分解办法获取耕地组分的NDVI时序特征,再利用识别模型判定,然后结合土地利用数据根据空间关系得到中分辨率结果;玉米与其他作物的混合像元则利用中分辨率尺度光谱差异加以区分。研究结果表明,在伊洛河流域主要农业区,识别精度达到90.33%,为作物类型识别提供了新的思路。     

作物残体去向与利用及对土壤氮素转化的影响

近年来,作物残体还田受到了很大的关注,一方面它可以改进土壤氮素的动态变化,减少硝态氮淋失;另一方面可作为提高耕地土壤作为潜在氮储库的一种手段。作物残体是碳、氮的重要源和库,因此还田后会影响土壤中的氮素循环。本文综述了作物残体还田后对土壤氮素转化的影响及残体氮素的利用与去向问题。具体阐述了以下几个方面内容:作物残体的降解过程及影响因素,残体氮素的利用率及去向问题,以及作物残体对土壤无机氮库、有机氮库、微生物特征的影响。     

A Two-Step Filtering approach for detecting maize and soybean phenology with time-series MODIS data

The crop developmental stage represents essential information for irrigation scheduling/fertilizer management, understanding seasonal ecosystem carbon dioxide (CO₂) exchange, and evaluating crop productivity. In this study, we devised an approach called the Two-Step Filtering (TSF) for detecting the phenological stages of maize and soybean from time-series Wide Dynamic Range Vegetation Index (WDRVI) data derived from Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) 250-m observations. The TSF method consists of a Two-Step Filtering scheme that includes: (i) smoothing the temporal WDRVI data with a wavelet-based filter and (ii) deriving the optimum scaling parameters from shape-model fitting procedure. The date of key crop development stages are then estimated by using the optimum scaling parameters and an initial value of the specific phenological date on the shape model, which are preliminary defined in reference to ground-based crop growth stage observations. The shape model is a crop-specific WDRVI curve with typical seasonal features, which were defined by averaging smoothed, multi-year WDRVI profiles from MODIS 250-m data collected over irrigated maize and soybean study sites.In this study, the TSF method was applied to MODIS-derived WDRVI data over a 6-year period (2003 to 2008) for two irrigated sites and one rainfed site planted to either maize or soybean as part of the Carbon Sequestration Program (CSP) at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. A comparison of satellite-based retrievals with ground-based crop growth stage observations collected by the CSP over the six growing seasons for these three sites showed that the TSF method can accurately estimate the date of four key phenological stages of maize (V2.5: early vegetative stage, R1: silking stage, R5: dent stage and R6: maturity) and soybean (V1: early vegetative stage, R5: beginning seed, R6: full seed and R7: beginning maturity). The root mean square error (RMSE) of phenological-stage estimation for maize ranged from 2.9 [R1] to 7.0 [R5] days and from 3.2 [R6] to 6.9 [R7] days for soybean, respectively. In addition, the TSF method was also applied for two years (2001 and 2002) over eastern Nebraska to test its ability to characterize the spatio-temporal patterns of these key phenological stages over a larger geographic area. The MODIS-derived crop phenological stage dates agreed well with the statistical crop progress data reported by the United State Department of Agriculture (USDA) National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) for eastern Nebraska's three crop agricultural statistic districts (ASDs). At the ASD-level, the RMSE of phenological-stage estimation ranged from 1.6 [R1] to 5.6 [R5] days for maize and from 2.5 [R7] to 5.3 [R5] days for soybean.     

Effects of soil composition and mineralogy on remote sensing of crop residue cover

The management of crop residues (non-photosynthetic vegetation) in agricultural fields influences soil erosion and soil carbon sequestration. Remote sensing methods can efficiently assess crop residue cover and related tillage intensity over many fields in a region. Although the reflectance spectra of soils and crop residues are often similar in the visible, near infrared, and the lower part of the shortwave infrared (400-1900 nm) wavelength region, specific diagnostic chemical absorption features are evident in the upper shortwave infrared (1900-2500 nm) region. Two reflectance band height indices used for estimating residue cover are the Cellulose Absorption Index (CAI) and the Lignin-Cellulose Absorption (LCA) index, both of which use reflectances in the upper shortwave infrared (SWIR). Soil mineralogy and composition will affect soil spectral properties and may limit the usefulness of these spectral indices in certain areas. Our objectives were to (1) identify minerals and soil components with absorption features in the 2000 nm to 2400 nm wavelength region that would affect CAI and LCA and (2) assess their potential impact on remote sensing estimates of crop residue cover. Most common soil minerals had CAI values ≤ 0.5, whereas crop residues were always > 0.5, allowing for good contrast between soils and residues. However, a number of common soil minerals had LCA values > 0.5, and, in some cases, the mineral LCA values were greater than those of the crop residues, which could limit the effectiveness of LCA for residue cover estimation. The LCA of some dry residues and live corn canopies were similar in value, unlike CAI. Thus, the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) or similar method should be used to separate out green vegetation pixels. Mineral groups, such as garnets and chlorites, often have wide ranges of CAI and LCA values, and thus, mineralogical analyses often do not identify individual mineral species required for precise CAI estimation. However, these methods are still useful for identifying mineral soils requiring additional scrutiny. Future advanced multi- and hyperspectral remote sensing platforms should include CAI bands to allow for crop residue cover estimation.     

Bridging rigorous assessment of water availability from field to catchment scale with a parsimonious agro-hydrological model

While simple crop and hydrological models are limited with respect to the number and accuracy of the processes they incorporate, complex models have high demand for data. Due to the limitations of both categories of models, there is a need for new agro-hydrological models that simulate both crop productivity and water availability in agricultural catchments, with low data and calibration requirements. This study aimed at developing a widely applicable parsimonious agro-hydrological model, AquaCrop-Hydro, which couples the AquaCrop crop water productivity model with a conceptual hydrological model. AquaCrop-Hydro, simulating crop productivity, the daily soil water balance and discharge at the catchment outlet, performed well for an agricultural catchment in Belgium. The model can be used to investigate the effect of agricultural management and environmental changes from field to catchment scale in support of sustainable water management in agricultural areas.