Enzyme Deactivation in Reactors

The influence of enzyme deactivation on substrate conversion in different reactor types is examined. The influence of inter- and intra-particle diffusion on deactivation and on effectiveness factor is analyzed. Optimum temperature operations criterion and policies are presented for reactors with deactivating catalysts. Appropriate examples are provided to highlight the different concepts presented.     

Processing power limits social group size: computational evidence for the cognitive costs of sociality

Sociality is primarily a coordination problem. However, the social (or communication) complexity hypothesis suggests that the kinds of information that can be acquired and processed may limit the size and/or complexity of social groups that a species can maintain. We use an agent-based model to test the hypothesis that the complexity of information processed influences the computational demands involved. We show that successive increases in the kinds of information processed allow organisms to break through the glass ceilings that otherwise limit the size of social groups: larger groups can only be achieved at the cost of more sophisticated kinds of information processing that are disadvantageous when optimal group size is small. These results simultaneously support both the social brain and the social complexity hypotheses.     

Constructing more informative plant–pollinator networks: visitation and pollen deposition networks in a heathland plant community

Interaction networks are widely used as tools to understand plant–pollinator communities, and to examine potential threats to plant diversity and food security if the ecosystem service provided by pollinating animals declines. However, most networks to date are based on recording visits to flowers, rather than recording clearly defined effective pollination events. Here we provide the first networks that explicitly incorporate measures of pollinator effectiveness (PE) from pollen deposition on stigmas per visit, and pollinator importance (PI) as the product of PE and visit frequency. These more informative networks, here produced for a low diversity heathland habitat, reveal that plant–pollinator interactions are more specialized than shown in most previous studies. At the studied site, the specialization index was lower for the visitation network than the PE network, which was in turn lower than for the PI network. Our study shows that collecting PE data is feasible for community-level studies in low diversity communities and that including information about PE can change the structure of interaction networks. This could have important consequences for our understanding of threats to pollination systems.     

Integration of multi-objective structural optimization into cementless hip prosthesis design: Improved Austin-Moore model

A new strategy of multi-objective structural optimization is integrated into Austin-Moore prosthesis in order to improve its performance. The new resulting model is so-called Improved Austin-Moore. The topology optimization is considered as a conceptual design stage to sketch several kinds of hollow stems according to the daily loading cases. The shape optimization presents the detailed design stage considering several objectives. Here, A new multiplicative formulation is proposed as a performance scale in order to define the best compromise between several requirements. Numerical applications on 2D and 3D problems are carried out to show the advantages of the proposed model.     

Optimization of Influencing Parameters on Phenanthrene Removal Efficiency in Soil Washing Process by Using Response Surface Methodology

Response surface methodology (RSM) under Box–Behnken design (BBD) was applied to evaluate the effect of the influencing parameters including surfactant concentration, liquid/soil ratio, Humic Acid concentration, and washing time on phenanthrene removal efficiency in soil washing process by using the nonionic surfactant Tween 80 and find an optimal operational conditions to achieve the highest removal efficiency. A polynomial quadratic model was used to correlate phenanthrene removal efficiency and four independent variables (R² = 0.9719). Based on the obtained results the most influential parameter on phenanthrene removal efficiency was surfactant concentration with an impact value of 69.519%. Liquid/soil ratio was also another factor that significantly influenced on removal efficiency with an impact value of 25.014%. The interaction between surfactant concentration and liquid/soil ratio was also shown to have a positive significant effect on removal efficiency (p_value = 0.0027). However, the other independent variables Humic Acid concentration and time were not significant in the ranges selected in this study. Based on the optimization results maximum removal efficiency of 70.692 ± 3.647% was achieved under the conditions of surfactant concentration 5000 mg L^?1, liquid/soil ratio 30 v/w, HA concentration 9.88 mg L^?1, and washing time 2 h, which was in good agreement with predicted value (66.643%).     

Understanding cell fate acquisition in stem-cell-derived pancreatic islets using single-cell multiome-inferred regulomes

1. Download : Download high-res image (205KB)
2. Download : Download full-size image

     

中国主要农产品虚拟要素贸易网络结构特征分析

据虚拟水概念定义虚拟要素,并将其划分为虚拟资源要素和虚拟生态要素两类,选取虚拟资源要素中的耕地要素和虚拟生态要素中的化肥/农药要素为研究对象,定量分析2002—2016年以粮食贸易为载体的虚拟耕地、虚拟化肥/农药要素的贸易量,构建虚拟要素贸易网络,通过复杂网络的研究方法,结果表明:2002—2016年我国主要农产品虚拟耕地、化肥/农药要素的贸易总量呈下降趋势,降幅分别约25.51%、8.01%;虚拟耕地要素网络节点入度较大的为长江中下游、华南、西南地区,出度较大的为黄淮海和东北地区,虚拟化肥/农药要素网络与之相反;地区间节点强度的差异性大,虚拟耕地要素差值最大可达1459.56万hm~2,虚拟化肥/农药要素达61.38万t;二者网络节点度和强度的累积分布均符合幂律分布规律,其尾部的"重尾"现象揭示了节点度和强度的高可变性以及网络结构的脆弱性;虚拟耕地要素的输入区网络同配,输出区网络异配,揭示了地区间耕地要素的流动既呈集聚又有分散的态势,虚拟化肥/农药要素网络节点相关性皆为减函数,网络异配,揭示了虚拟化肥/农药要素在八大区域间联通的状况。网络结构特征分析为研究网络抗毁性特征和网络的优化调控机制奠定基础,为中国粮食贸易格局和粮价制定以及各个地区的农业种植结构调整提供理论依据。     

Costs for switching partners reduce network dynamics but not cooperative behaviour

Social networks represent the structuring of interactions between group members. Above all, many interactions are profoundly cooperative in humans and other animals. In accordance with this natural observation, theoretical work demonstrates that certain network structures favour the evolution of cooperation. Yet, recent experimental evidence suggests that static networks do not enhance cooperative behaviour in humans. By contrast, dynamic networks do foster cooperation. However, costs associated with dynamism such as time or resource investments in finding and establishing new partnerships have been neglected so far. Here, we show that human participants are much less likely to break links when costs arise for building new links. Especially, when costs were high, the network was nearly static. Surprisingly, cooperation levels in Prisoner''s Dilemma games were not affected by reduced dynamism in social networks. We conclude that the mere potential to quit collaborations is sufficient in humans to reach high levels of cooperative behaviour. Effects of self-structuring processes or assortment on the network played a minor role: participants simply adjusted their cooperative behaviour in response to the threats of losing a partner or of being expelled.