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An overview of various industrial and bio-applications of unavoidable bio-waste materials reported in the literature over the last 25 years is presented in this review. Calcium-based food wastes or "unavoidable bio-wastes" are hybrid bio-composite materials, consisting of a softer organic matrix surrounding a stiff mineralized ceramic phase. A wide range of different bio-wastes that are already in use or are investigated for multipurpose applications are presented. Bio-wastes hold considerable potential to contribute more widely to the circular management strategy through, for example, being processed to make new consumer products for a variety of applications, which include the use as a filler in polymers, biogenic hydroxyapatite, limestone or lime in construction products, nutritional feed supplements, soil-improving material and fertilizer, or precursor for making catalysts and adsorbents for the remediation of environmental contaminants. This review summarizes the results of various reported approaches with regard to the development of cost-effective value-added products from under-utilized food waste residues such as eggshells, seafood shells, and animal bones via a simple, eco-friendly, and economically viable approach. Therefore, the work is an advancement toward the goal of achieving a sustainable product by ensuring a holistic design approach from bio-wastes to various salable products, where calcium-based food wastes can compete with non-renewable resources., Competing Interests: Declarations. Ethics approval and consent to participate: Not applicable. Consent for publication: Not applicable. Competing interests: The author declares no competing interests., (© 2024. The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature.)

The choice of the appropriate material having suitable compositional and morphological surface characteristics, is a crucial step in the development of orthopedic implants. The purpose of this paper is to elucidate, on this regard, the influence of two important hits, i.e., biogenic apatite with bone-like composition and nanostructured morphology, providing the evidence of the efficacy of nanostructured biogenic apatite coatings in favoring adhesion, growth, proliferation, and in vitro osteogenic differentiation of human mesenchymal stromal cells (hMSCs) isolated from the bone marrow. The specific features of this coating in terms of topographical and biochemical cues, obtained by Ionized Jet Deposition, are perceived by hMSCs, as suggested by changes in different morphologic parameters as Aspect Ratio or Elongation index, suggesting the impact exerted by the nanostructure on early adhesion events, cytoskeleton organization, and cells fate. In addition, the nanostructured CaP coating sustained the metabolic activity of the cells and facilitated the osteogenic differentiation of MSC by supporting the osteogenesis-related gene expression. These findings support the use of a combined approach between technological advancement and instructive surfaces, both from the topographical and the biochemical point of view, in order to manufacture smart biomaterials able to respond to different needs of the orthopedic practice., (Copyright © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)

Reconstructing the living environment of extinct vertebrates is often challenging due to the lack of proxies. We propose a new proxy to the living environment based on the combined oxygen and sulphur stable isotope analysis of vertebrate hydroxyapatite. We tested this isotopic proxy to 64 biogenic apatite (bones) samples that represent a wide spectrum of the extant vertebrate phylogenetic diversity including crocodiles, snakes, turtles, mammals, birds, lizards, fish and amphibians. We show that the combination of these two isotopic systems allows the living environment of all these vertebrates to be unambiguously distinguished between freshwater (aquatic vs semi-aquatic), seawater (aquatic vs semi-aquatic) and terrestrial. The main goal of this study is to provide a present-day isotopic reference frame and to discuss methodological issues that will serve to interpret future oxygen and sulphur isotope results obtained either from fossil or modern skeletal material. This new isotopic approach of combined oxygen and sulphur isotope analysis will be particularly useful to document major aquatic-terrestrial transitions in the fossil record but also to better constrain the living environment of some present-day species.

Oxygen isotope fractionation factors for phosphates were calculated by means of the increment method. The results suggest that Ag3PO4 and BiPO4 are enriched in (18)O relative to AgPO4, and the three phosphates are consistently depleted in (18)O relative to Ba3[PO4]2; fluorapatite and chlorapatite exhibit a similar behaviour of oxygen isotope fractionation with consistent enrichment of (18)O relative to hydroxyapatite. The valence, radii and coordination of metal cations play a quantitative role in dictating the (18)O/(16)O partitioning in these phosphates of different compositions. The calculated fractionation factors for the Ag3PO4-H2O system are in agreement with experimental determinations derived from enzyme-catalysed isotope exchange between dissolved inorganic phosphate and water at the longest reaction durations at low temperatures. This demonstrates that the precipitated Ag3PO4 has completely captured the oxygen isotope fractionation in the dissolved inorganic phosphate. The calculated fractionation factors for the F/Cl-apatite-water systems are in agreement with the enzyme-catalysed experimental fractionations for the dissolved phosphate-water system at the longest reaction durations but larger than fractionations derived from bacteria-facilitated exchange and inorganic precipitation experiments as well as natural observations. For the experimental calibrations of oxygen isotope fractionation involving the precipitation of dissolved phosphate species from aqueous solutions, the fractionation between precipitate and water is primarily dictated by the isotope equilibration between the dissolved complex anions and water prior to the precipitation. Therefore, the present results provide a quantitative means to interpret the temperature dependence of oxygen isotope fractionation in inorganic and biogenic phosphates.