Environmental assessment of anaerobically digested sludge reuse in agriculture: Potential impacts of emerging micropollutants

Agricultural application of sewage sludge has been emotionally discussed in the last decades, because the latter contains organic micropollutants with unknown fate and risk potential. In this work, the reuse of anaerobically digested sludge in agriculture is evaluated from an environmental point of view by using Life Cycle Assessment methodology. More specifically, the potential impacts of emerging micropollutants, such as pharmaceuticals and personal care products, present in the sludge have been quantified. Four scenarios were considered according to the temperature of the anaerobic digestion (mesophilic or thermophilic) and the sludge retention time (20 or 10 d), and they have been compared with the non-treated sludge.From an environmental point of view, the disposal of undigested sludge is not the most suitable alternative, except for global warming due to the dominance (65-85%) of the indirect emissions associated to the electricity use. Nutrient-related direct emissions dominate the eutrophication category impact in all the scenarios (>71.4%), although a beneficial impact related to the avoidance of industrial fertilisers production is also quantified (up to 6.7%). In terms of human and terrestrial toxicity, the direct emissions of heavy metals to soil dominate these two impact categories (>70%), and the contribution of other micropollutants is minimal. Moreover, only six (Galaxolide, Tonalide, Diazepam, Ibuprofen, Sulfamethoxazole and 17α-ethinyloestradiol) out of the 13 substances considered are really significant since they account for more than 95% of the overall micropollutants impact.     

Modeling the thermal stability of enzyme-based in vitro diagnostics biosensors

Performance of in vitro diagnostics biosensors may change over lifetime, particularly if environmental storage conditions such as temperature are not controlled. Biosensors are composed of diverse multiple components such as salts, polymers and biological components which may be differentially impacted by chemical and physical transformations induced by changes in temperature and exposure to humidity, oxygen and light. Mathematical models for predicting the influence of temperature on biosensor performance over time typically assume the changes follow first-order dynamics, with the temperature dependence of the rate of change described by an Arrhenius kinetic expression. However, the compositional diversity found in many biosensors may cause the assumption of first-order dynamics for sensor stability to be invalid. In this paper, a second-order dynamic model is developed to predict the change in biosensor performance over time for a single-use biosensor used in a point-of-care diagnostics system. The model consists of a reversible reaction followed by an irreversible reaction, with rate coefficients having Arrhenius temperature dependencies. The second-order dynamic model provides improved predictions, based on a comparison for two experimental datasets used for estimation, and on a validation dataset. The resulting model has applications for shelf-life prediction, designing accelerated testing experiments, biosensor improvement and the development of biosensor storage guidelines. Finally, it is shown that the concept of “mean kinetic temperature”, used widely in the pharmaceutical industry and based on first-order dynamics, can be applied successfully to a biosensor system exhibiting higher-order dynamic behaviour using a second-order model. This suggests that mean kinetic temperature concepts may be extended to in vitro diagnostics sensor applications.     

创建可持续发展的人类住区初探——以天津西华苑居住区规划设计为例

如何在我国的居住区规划中真正实现“创建可持续发展的人类住区”这一目标，是值得认真研究的课题。文章介绍了天津西华苑居住区的规划竞赛方案，并从生态、文化和对人的关怀三个方面作了有益的探索。     

城市文化遗产保护中不可公度性辨析与反思——南京梧桐树事件为例

通过对南京护树运动的分析,从保护价值与民生价值的视角,解析了政府与民众在文化遗产及其保护行为上的逻辑差异,指出两种逻辑标准下的文化遗产保护拥有不同的概念框架和度量单位,具有不可公度性。由此对文化遗产保护的路径进行了反思,提出沿袭营造学社研究中国古代建筑的方法,用"全部文化史"的视角"依科学之眼光作系统之研究"来实现城市转型下的文化遗产保护路径优化。     

我国临终关怀医院设计的人文向度

随着科技的发展,医疗手段的变革,现代医院在设计上更加注重设备的先进性和功能组织上的高效率,却往往因此而忽略了人在医疗环境中的精神感知。死亡,作为人类生命的一部分在现代医院设计中不但得不到体现,反而遭到了隐藏和排斥．尤其是临终病人这一群体的特殊需求始终被现代社会所忽视,特别是在中国。本文初步讨论了中外哲学死亡观,西方医院的发展历程以及国外优秀案例分析,希望能给中国的临终医院设计领域带来一些启发。     

基于XGBoost和SHAP的急性肾损伤可解释预测模型

重症监护病房(ICU)住院期间发生的急性肾损伤(AKI)与患者发病率和死亡率的增加有关。该研究的目的是提出一个基于机器学习的框架,用于危重病患者的可解释AKI预测,该框架能够同时实现良好的预测和解释能力。该文从重症监护医学信息数据库Ⅲ(MIMIC-III)中提取的数据包括患者的年龄、性别、生命体征和ICU入院第1天及随后的化验值。在该研究中,通过将XGBoost模型与其他4种机器学习模型进行比较,证明了XGBoost模型的预测性能。此外,SHAP(SHapley Additive exPlanation)模型可解释器用于提供个性化评估和解释,以实现个性化的临床决策支持。结果表明,XGBoost能较好地预测AKI,与以往的预测模型相比,此模型更为简单有效,仅用21个特征变量即得到了更稳定的预测结果,预测精度高,模型准确率和受试者工作特征曲线下面积(AUC)分别为0.824和0.840,均高于既往研究结果。此外,该文对两组指标进行了特征依赖分析,发现24h尿量减少和血尿素氮升高可增加AKI风险。综上所述,该可解释预测模型可能有助于临床医生更准确快速地识别重症监护中存在AKI风险的患者,为患者提供更好的治疗。此外,可解释性框架的使用增加了模型透明度,便于临床医生分析预测模型的可靠性。     

探讨糖尿病以时间护理的分析与应用体会

目的分析利用时间护理理论来指导糖尿病患者的护理工作。方法根据患者的病情,对患者进行心理护理,饮食、运动、药物指导,血糖监测。结果大多数患者自觉遵守饮食、运动、药物治疗,血糖控制良好,对护理工作满意。结论以时间护理理论对糖尿病患者进行护理,合理地分配护理时间,指导糖尿病护理工作,具有重要意性。     

‘Remember Who You Are Designing For’: An Interview with Baroness Sally Greengross OBE

Baroness Sally Greengross has a long and deep knowledge of issues surrounding ageing. Until 2000 she was Director General of Age Concern for 13 years, and also joint Chair of the Institute of Gerontology at King's College London and Secretary General of Eurolink Age. She is now President/Chief Executive of the International Longevity Centre-UK (ILC-UK), an influential think-tank impacting policy on longevity, ageing and population change. Since 2000, she has been a crossbench (independent) member of the House of Lords and she chairs five All-Party Parliamentary Groups: Dementia, Corporate Responsibility, Intergenerational Futures, Continence Care, and Ageing and Older People (Co-Chair). Here, the Editor of AD, Helen Castle , interviews her on shifting attitudes to ageing and the importance of designing for the older population.     

Safety Issues on Global Projects

Global construction projects that involve collaboration between participants from multiple countries can often lead to conflicts and delays due to different cultural perceptions of acceptable levels of safety among the different project participants. The current literature has not explored the origins, extent and costs of these delays, as well as ways to remedy them on global projects. Detailed case studies of four comparable global infrastructure projects indicate that legal rules, cultural values and the prevailing economic situation in their countries of origin, influenced project participants’ perception of safety. Differing mindsets on these projects clashed, leading to project delays and costs. Project participants unsuccessfully attempted to use a strategy of education to improve safety levels, and then resorted to more successful coercive strategies such as the imposition of fines. This research contributes to: practice, by identifying challenges that international contractors face when attempting to transfer safety techniques to developing countries on short-term global projects; and to theory by shedding light on cultural challenges faced on global projects.     

中国古典文人园林养生思想与造园的相关性初探

研究古典园林的意义在于与古为 新,在“养生”日益受到重视的当今,探索养 生思想与造园的关系是以其现实价值进行 古典园林研究的一种途径。通过资料分析 与比较研究,重点阐述两者在四方面具有相 关性,即养生思想与造园主体同源,养生思 想与造园发展脉络相合,养生是造园目的之 一,养生思想影响园林要素营造。从文人园 林养生思想与造园的相关性角度,对古典园 林于“养生”的现实意义提供研究基础。