Capsiate Intake with Exercise Training Additively Reduces Fat Deposition in Mice on a High-Fat Diet,but Not without Exercise Training

While exercise training (ET) is an efficient strategy to manage obesity, it is recommended with a dietary plan to maximize the antiobesity functions owing to a compensational increase in energy intake. Capsiate is a notable bioactive compound for managing obesity owing to its capacity to increase energy expenditure. We aimed to examine whether the antiobesity effects of ET can be further enhanced by capsiate intake (CI) and determine its effects on resting energy expenditure and metabolic molecules. Mice were randomly divided into four groups (n = 8 per group) and fed high-fat diet. Mild-intensity treadmill ET was conducted five times/week; capsiate (10 mg/kg) was orally administered daily. After 8 weeks, resting metabolic rate and metabolic molecules were analyzed. ET with CI additively reduced the abdominal fat rate by 18% and solely upregulated beta-3-adrenoceptors in adipose tissue (p = 0.013) but did not affect the metabolic molecules in skeletal muscles. Surprisingly, CI without ET significantly increased the abdominal fat rate (p = 0.001) and reduced energy expenditure by 9%. Therefore, capsiate could be a candidate compound for maximizing the antiobesity effects of ET by upregulating beta-3-adrenoceptors in adipose tissue, but CI without ET may not be beneficial in managing obesity.     

Research on phase shift characteristics of electromagnetic wave in plasma

The phase shift characteristics reflect the state change of electromagnetic wave in plasma sheath and can be used to reveal deeply the action mechanism between electromagnetic wave and plasma sheath. In this paper, the phase shift characteristics of electromagnetic wave propagation in plasma were investigated. Firstly, the impact factors of phase shift including electron density,collision frequency and incident frequency were discussed. Then, the plasma with different electron density distribution profiles were employed to investigate the influence on the phase shift characteristics. In a real case, the plasma sheath around the hypersonic vehicle will affect and even break down the communication. Based on the hypersonic vehicle model, we studied the electromagnetic wave phase shift under different flight altitude, speed, and attack angle. The results indicate that the phase shift is inversely proportional to the flight altitude and positively proportional to the flight speed and attack angle. Our work provides a theoretical guidance for the further research of phase shift characteristics and parameters inversion in plasma.     

Screening of frozen-thawed conditions for keeping nutritive compositions and physicochemical characteristics of goat milk

Frozen milk can help producers overcome the seasonality of goat milk production, low goat production and short lactation periods, and avoid discarding milk during some special periods. We investigated effects of combination between freezing (cryogenic refrigerator of ?16 to ?20°C or ultra-cryogenic refrigerator of ?76 to ?80°C) and thawing (homeothermy of 20 to 25°C or refrigeration of 2 to 4°C) on nutritive compositions and physicochemical characteristics of raw goat milk during storage period (80 d). Compared with fresh goat milk, the frozen-thawed milk decreased contents of fat, protein, and lactose, as well as surface tension and stability coefficient, whereas increased effective diameter and polydispersity index. The average values of color values (L*, a*, and b*) in 4 group samples changed from 83.01 to 82.25, ?1.40 to ?1.54, 3.51 to 3.81, respectively, and the ΔE of most samples did not exceed 2. In contrast to the other 3 frozen-thawed treatments, goat milk treated with ultra-cryogenic freezing-homeothermic thawing (UFHT) possessed higher fat (5.20 g/100 g), smaller effective particle diameter (0.32 µm), and the lowest polydispersity index value (0.26). The color and confocal laser scanning microscopy images of UFHT were similar to those of fresh goat milk, illustrating UFHT was the optimal approach to maintain the natural quality of goat milk. Our finding provides a theoretical basis for producers to freeze surplus milk.     

A Complexing Agent to Enable a Wide-Temperature Range Bromine-Based Flow Battery for Stationary Energy Storage

Bromine-based flow batteries (Br-FBs) are considered one of the most promising energy storage systems due to their features of high energy density and low cost. However, they generally suffer from uncontrolled diffusion of corrosive bromine particularly at high temperatures. That is because the interaction between polybromide anions and the commonly used complexing agent (N–methyl–N–ethyl–pyrrolidinium bromide [MEP]) decreases with increasing temperatures, which causes serious self-discharge and capacity fade. Herein, a novel bromine complexing agent, 1–ethyl–2–methyl–pyridinium bromide (BCA), is introduced in Br-FBs to solve the above problems. It is proven that BCA can combine with polybromide anions very well even at a high temperature of 60 °C. Moreover, the BCA contributes to decreasing the electrochemical polarization of Br⁻/Br₂ couple, which in turn improves their power density. As a result, a zinc–bromine flow battery with BCA as the complexing agent can achieve a high energy efficiency of 84% at 40 mA cm⁻², even at high temperature of 60 °C and it can stably run for more than 400 cycles without obvious performance decay. This paper provides an effective complexing agent to enable a wide temperature range Br-FB.     

Inductive effect in Mn-doped ZnO nanoribon arrays grown on Ni foam: A promising key for boosted capacitive and high specific energy supercapacitors

Transition metal oxides have been explored in supercapacitor applications owing to their safety, low cost, high specific capacitance and high electrochemical activity. Among all transition metal oxides, zinc oxide based materials show remarkable response for designing the supercapacitors with high electrochemical activity. Here in, Mn doped ZnO (Zn_1-xMn_xO₃ with x = 0, 0.25, 0.50, 0.75 and 1) was synthesized by a facile hydrothermal method. Doping of Mn into the ZnO increased the surface area and decease the charge transfer resistance for the Zn_0.5Mn_0.5O₃. All the synthesized materials were characterized by x-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy SEM), BET, electrochemical tests and other various analytical techniques to confirm the structural, morphological, textural and suprcapacitive properties. The synthesized material Zn_0.5Mn_0.5O₃ having the porous nanoribons structure with BET surface area (2490 cm²/g). The electrochemical studies showed significantly enhanced response toward pseudocapacitive nature. The synthesized material exhibited the excellent specific capacitance (515F/g), specific energy (28.61 Wh/kg) and specific power (1000 W/kg) at current density of 2 mA/g. Such impressive and superior properties make the MnZnO₃ material as promising candidate for new generation supercapacitor applications.     

Rapid synthesis of garnet-type Li7La3Zr2O12 solid electrolyte with superior electrochemical performance

Li₇La₃Zr₂O₁₂-based garnet-type solid electrolytes are promising candidates for use in all-solid-state lithium batteries (ASSLBs). However, their potential in large-scale commercial applications is largely hindered by the time/energy-consuming and lithium-wasting synthetic method which typically needs a long-duration high temperature solid state reaction process. Herein we invent a fast preparation route that involves a short-period thermal reaction (1100 °C for 10 min) in laboratory muffle furnaces following by conventional hot pressing technique to get almost fully dense (Al, Ga, Ta, Nb)-doped garnet-type electrolytes with high phase purity (>99.9 %). The large and compact grains, low porosity and high phase purities of garnet ceramic electrolytes synthesized in this study ensure superior electrochemical performance. Particularly, Ga-doped cubic Li₇La₃Zr₂O₁₂ shows extremely low E_a values (0.17?0.18 eV) and record-high lithium ionic conductivities (>2 × 10^?3 S cm^-1 at 25 °C).     

Potential of renewable energy system utilisation at decentralised level in the state of Uttarakhand in India

ABSTRACT

Design and implementation of an effective dissemination programme for decentralised renewable energy system necessitate an accurate estimate of its utilisation potential. Hence, in this study, an attempt has been made to develop frameworks to estimate the utilisation potential of decentralised renewable energy systems in the state of Uttarakhand in India. Estimations imply large resource, technical and economic potentials of the domestic solar water heater, solar home system, solar lantern, family size biogas plant and improved biomass cookstove in Uttarakhand. With higher impact on the purchasing power of households, prevailing soft loan scheme has been found to be more appropriate than a capital subsidy for promoting the usage of decentralised renewable energy systems.     

Coupling in situ experiments and modeling – Opportunities for data fusion,machine learning,and discovery of emergent behavior

This paper reviews recent studies, that not only includes both experiments and modeling components, but celebrates a close coupling between these techniques, in order to provide insights into the plasticity and failure of polycrystalline metals. Examples are provided of studies across multiple-scales, including, but not limited to, density functional theory combined with atom probe tomography, molecular dynamics combined with in situ transmission electron miscopy, discrete dislocation dynamics combined with nanopillars experiments, crystal plasticity combined with digital image correlation, and crystal plasticity combined with in situ high energy X-ray diffraction. The close synergy between in situ experiments and modeling provides new opportunities for model calibration, verification, and validation, by providing direct means of comparison, thus removing aspects of epistemic uncertainty in the approach. Further, data fusion between in situ experimental and model-based data, along with data driven approaches, provides a paradigm shift for determining the emergent behavior of deformation and failure, which is the foundation that underpins the mechanical behavior of polycrystalline materials.     

Levelized cost of energy definition – An economic paradox

Using mean value theorem for integrals we show that the well-known LCOE definition is incorrect.