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Recycling organic waste and converting them into renewable energy is a promising route for cleaning environment and effective industrial reactions. This study targeted to isolate a pure anaerobic culture with potential to hydrolyze different biomass and bio-H2 production. For this, a sample of full-scale anaerobic digester, fed with a mixture of biomass was inoculated on Reinforced Clostridial Medium (RCM) in strict anaerobic conditions. An anaerobic Clostridium Butyricum CBT-1 strain was isolated, identified from morphological and 16S rRNA sequence. The strain expressed amylase, cellulase and peroxidases activities. CBT-1 efficiently showed fast growth rate of 3.10 OD/600nm after 72 hours incubation time on Azure B and crystal violet dyes. The strain exhibited 82.4% and 78.5% decolorization of Azure B and crystal violet dyes respectively. In batch fermentation experiment, the CBT-1 produced highest of 3.06, 2.67 and 2.46 mol/mole H2 yield from glucose, starch and cellulose respectively. Whereas, the CBT-1 showed low 0.43 mol/mole from untreated rice straw, and comparatively high H2 yield of 1.91 and 2.01 mol/mole rice straw hydrolysate and kitchen waste respectively. The cumulative volumetric yield of H2 was 358.15, 300.8 and 294.5NmL/gSub from glucose, starch and cellulose respectively. Similarly, the cumulative H2 volume was 76.7, 184.4, 237.2 NmL/gVS from untreated rice straw, rice straw hydrolysate and kitchen food waste. This study emphasizes the prospects to find similar robust anaerobic culture for hydrolyzing complex biomass. Such strains could be used as standard co-inoculum for bio-H2 and biocatalyst for commercial scale applications.

This study was conducted to increase the enzymatic activity of Bacillus licheniformis XS-4, which was isolated from the traditional fermented mash of Xianshi soy sauce. The mutation was induced by atmospheric and room-temperature plasma (ARTP), and a mutant strain, mut80, was obtained. mut80 exhibited significant increases in protease and amylase activity by 90.54% and 143.10%, respectively, and the enhanced enzymatic activities were stably maintained after 20 consecutive incubations. Re-sequencing analysis of mut80 revealed that the mutation sites were located in 1518447(AT-T) and 4253106(G-A) in its genome, which was involved in the metabolic pathways of amino acids. The expression of the protease synthetic gene (aprX) increased 1.54 times, while that of the amylase gene (amyA) increased 11.26 times, as confirmed via RT-qPCR. Using ARTP mutagenesis, the present study proposes a highly efficient microbial resource with enhanced protease and amylase activity provided by B. licheniformis, which can potentially be used to improve the efficiency of traditional soy sauce fermentation.

Fe-based oxygen carriers (OCs) are widely used in chemical looping steam reforming (CLSR) due to excellent resistance to carbon buildup, low toxicity, and high activity. In this study, a type of nano NiO-Fe

The steam reforming of bio-oil-derived acetic acid over the developed Ni/CeO2-ZnO nanoparticle catalysts for hydrogen production was studied. The correlations of CeO2 to ZnO mass ratio (CZMR) and nickel loading with the properties and performances of Ni/CeO2-ZnO catalysts were explored. The H2, CO, and potential H2 yields followed a Gaussian normal distribution with increasing the CZMR. An exponential function equation was established to correlate the H2, CO, and potential H2 yields with Ni loading. As the CZMR increased from 0 to 1/3, the H2 yield increased from 57.8 to 69.4%, with a growth rate of 20.1%. Further, on increasing the CZMR from 1/3 to 3, the H2 yield decreased by 37.6%. The CO yield showed a similar trend for the H2 yield on increasing the CZMR, which first increased to a peak value, then started to decrease rapidly and finally stabilized. The yield of H2 increased significantly from 20.6 to 73.5%, with the increase of nickel loading from 0 to 15%. Further, on increasing the nickel loading from 15 to 25%, the H2 yield increased by only 5.8%. With the CZMR of 1/3 and the nickel loading of 15%, the selectivities of H2 and CO were as high as 91.6 and 42.3%, respectively.

Probiotics have the functions of inhibiting pathogen infection and maintaining gastrointestinal homeostasis. The aim of this study was to investigate the preventive effect of Lactobacillus casei T1 (L. casei T1) isolated from kurut against the gastric inflammation and gut microbiota alteration induced by Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) infection. The results showed that L. casei T1 and its supernatant had a potent inhibitory effect on H. pylori growth in vitro. L. casei T1 adhered to GES-1 cells, down-regulated the expression of MUC5AC, IL-6, IL-8 and TNF-α in GES-1 cells induced by H. pylori. This followed by in vivo studies demonstrated that L. casei T1 pretreatment alleviated gastric inflammation and prevent gut microbiota alteration caused by H. pylori infection. These results demonstrated that L. casei T1 have a preventive effect against H. pylori infection and it can be served as a further development and utilization of probiotic.

P. petiolosa as a typical Chinese herbal medicine has been generally utilized as Chinese native medicine formulation for treatment of chronic bronchitis, bronchial asthma and pneumoconiosis. The objective of this study was to evaluate the anti-inflammatory and antibacterial activities of P. petiolosa ethyl acetate extract (PPEAE) against S. aureusin mice. In our study, mice were infected pneumonia by S. aureus, colonization of S. aureus in lung tissue was calculated and the number of white blood cells (WBC) in blood was measured. Meanwhile, the hematoxylin-eosin staining (HE) was observed and the Real-time PCR was employed to determine the relative mRNA expression. The results showed that, after treated with PPEAE the wet/dry (W/D) weight ratio and the number of WBC decreased dramatically, the number of S. aureus was significantly reduced. Furthermore, HE staining showed that PPEAE obviously relieved the inflammation of infected mice and real-time PCR results indicated that PPEAE significantly down regulated the inflammatory iNOS, TNF-α and up regulated the anti-inflammatory HO-1 mRNA. In summary, our study revealed that application of crude product PPEAE had prominent antibacterial activity against S. aureus. PPEAE significantly reduced the biomass of S. aureus and effectively relieved the inflammation of S. aureus-induced pneumonia.

The development of various non-fullerene acceptors has further promoted the efficiencies of organic solar cells in the past years. Subphthalocyanine has been recently emerging as an electron accept...

P. petiolosa as a typical Chinese herbal medicine has been generally utilized as Chinese native medicine formulation for treatment of chronic bronchitis, bronchial asthma and pneumoconiosis. The objective of this study was to evaluate the anti-inflammatory and antibacterial activities of P. petiolosa ethyl acetate extract (PPEAE) against S. aureus in mice. The air-dried leaves were extracted with ethyl acetate, mice were infected pneumonia by S. aureus. Colonization of S. aureus in lung tissue was calculated by plate colony count. The number of white blood cells (WBC) in blood was measured by blood cell automatic analyzer. The histopathological analysis of hematoxylin-eosin staining (HE) of lung tissue was observed under microscope. Real-time PCR assay was employed to determine the relative mRNA expression of HO-1, iNOS and TNF-α. The results showed that, compared with control, after treated with PPEAE the wet/dry (W/D) weight ratio of mice lung tissue (decreased from 5.371 to 4.9) and the number of white blood cells (WBC) (decreased by 3.13×10

Atherosclerosis is the leading cause of death from vascular diseases worldwide, and endothelial cell (EC) dysfunction is the key cause of atherosclerosis. miR-155 was found to induce endothelial injury and to trigger atherosclerosis. In addition, brain and muscle ARNT-like protein-1 (Bmal1) has been found to be closely related to EC function. Therefore, the present study aimed to explore the mechanism underlying the regulation of Bmal1 by miR-155 in the induction of EC apoptosis and inflammatory response in atherosclerosis. The atherosclerosis model in apolipoprotein E (ApoE)- / - mice was established. miR-155 and Bmal1 expression was quantified by RT-qPCR and western blot analysis, respectively. The role of miR-155 and Bmal1 in atherosclerosis was evaluated through changes in cardiac function, plaque area, cardiomyocyte apoptosis, and inflammatory factor levels in mice. Moreover, the regulatory relationship between them was identified by dual-luciferase reporter gene assay to explore the mechanism of action of miR-155. After the modeling, the expression of miR-155 was upregulated and Bmal1 was downregulated in aorta, and there was a significant linear correlation between them. Upregulation of miR-155 increased the atherosclerotic plaque area, cell apoptosis, total cholesterol (TC) and triglyceride (TG), as well as weakened aortic diastolic function. However, opposite changes occurred after downregulation of miR-155 or an increase in Bmal1. In addition, the microRNA.org website predicted that there were targeted binding sites between miR-155 and Bmal1, which was verified with a dual-luciferase reporter gene assay. miR-155 was able to inhibit the expression by targeting Bmal1. Moreover, a rescue experiment showed that Bmal1 hindered the promotion of miR-155 in regards to atherosclerosis. In conclusion, miR-155 induces EC apoptosis and inflammatory response, weakens aortic diastolic function, and promotes the progression of atherosclerosis through targeted inhibition of Bmal1.

In order to explore the reforming process of biomass pyrolysis oil in depth, the catalytic steam reforming (SR) of crude bio-oil (BIO) derived from rapid pyrolysis of rice husk and its derivatives for hydrogen production was studied by means of a bench-scale fixed-bed unit combined with the FTIR/TCD technique. The physico-chemical properties and compositions of BIO were determined. Acetic acid (HOAc), ethylene glycol (EG), acetone (ACE) and phenol (PHE) were selected as four representative bio-oil derivatives. Evolution characteristics of H2, CO, CO2 and CH4 during SR of HOAc, EG, ACE, PHE and BIO were revealed and compared. The hydrogen yield increased sharply with reaction time to the peak values of 24.7%, 32.3%, 16.4%, 25.6% and 24.9%, corresponding to HOAc, EG, ACE, PHE and BIO, respectively. After that, the yield of hydrogen exhibited a downward trend, suggesting that the catalyst ability for selective hydrogen production gradually decreased. The H2 yield from EG was the highest, followed by PHE, HOAc, BIO and ACE. The order of CO yields from large to small was EG > HOAc > ACE > BIO ≈ PHE. The percentages of coke deposited on catalyst were arranged in descending order as HOAc > BIO > ACE > PHE > EG. This study could provide more detailed information on the catalytic reforming mechanism of bio-oil on the one hand, and also point out the direction for the improvement of the catalysts, which play a role in ensuring the high yield of H2 while converting CO to H2 through the water gas shift reaction.

Cost-effective and green separation of aromatic pollutant from waste water is of great importance in sustainable chemistry and engineering but under challenges of high energy consumption and unsatisfactory separation efficiency. Herein, induced by the electrostatic interactions, lignosulfonate (LS) based superparamagnetic composite LS@γ-Fe2O3 was developed without any surface modification and activation process. The LS@γ-Fe2O3 magnetic composites exhibited meaningful amphiphilicity and then were applied as efficient material for the separation of toluene/water system through the combination of gravity filtration and magnetic demulsification methods. The results demonstrated that the composites exhibited an excellent separation rate (over 99.05 %) towards toluene/water with gravity filtration method. For the water with low toluene content (

Perylene bisimide (PBI) unit has been widely used to design conjugated materials, which can be used as electron acceptor in organic solar cells due to its strong electron-deficient ability. In this work, a conjugated polymer based on PBI dimer as monomer was designed, synthesized, and compared to the conjugated polymer containing single PBI as repeating units. The two conjugated polymers were found to have similar molecular weight, absorption spectra and energy levels. Density functional theory calculation revealed that the PBI dimer-based polymer exhibited highly twisted conjugated backbone due to the large dihedral angle between the two PBI units. The PBI-based polymers as electron acceptor were applied into polymer-polymer solar cells, in which PBI dimer-based polymer solar cells were found to show a high short circuit current density (J sc = 11.2 mA∙cm−2 and a high power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 4.5%. In comparison, the solar cells based on PBI-based polymer acceptor only provided a J sc of 7.2 mA∙cm−2 and PCE of 2.5%. The significantly enhanced PCE in PBI dimer-based solar cells was attributed to the mixed phase in blended thin films, as revealed by atom force microscopy. This study demonstrates that PBI dimer can be used to design polymer acceptors for high performance polymerpolymer solar cells.

Corn stover can be converted into a high market value product via catalytic fast pyrolysis. Specifically, through thermochemical conversion, corn stover can be converted into biocrude oil with a high content of unstable phenols, most notably active phenols, which can readily react with aldehydes to form phenolic resins. Therefore, the higher the content of active phenols, the greater the economic value of biocrude oil. This is due to the potential for active phenols to serve as value-added compounds in the form of phenolic resins. Catalysts can be incorporated to improve the reaction rate and product quality during fast pyrolysis. In this study, the effects of three solid catalysts, dolomite, red mud and HZSM-5(25), on the production of active phenols were investigated. The Folin-ciocalteu (FC) method and gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) were utilized to quantify and classify the types of phenolic derivatives present within the bio-oil. The results showed that active phenols with a content exceeding 70% constituted the largest fraction of the phenol derivatives. The formation of active phenols, especially B-phenols, was enhanced by the incorporation of the catalysts HZSM-5, red mud and dolomite. HZSM-5 and dolomite exhibited the best catalytic effect on the production of A-phenols and B-phenols, respectively. The highest content of C-phenols (47.16%) was achieved when red mud was utilized as a catalyst. With regard to the total content of active phenol derivatives, the catalytic effect of dolomite was better than that of HZSM-5 and red mud. The content of total phenols and active phenols increased as the reaction temperature increased from 450oC to 600oC.

The Triassic-Jurassic stratigraphy in the Yanshan fold-thrust belt is dominated by nonmarine deposits, and the division of this stratigraphy remains controversial among geologists. Age results from biostratigraphic and isotope chronological studies are inconsistent, especially for the Dengzhangzi and Guojiadian Basins in the eastern part of the Yanshan belt. We present four new detrital zircon U–Pb isotope datasets for the Triassic-Jurassic stratigraphic units and one for the Permian unit in the basins. The geochronological results show that the andesitic breccia in the Permian strata was deposited at ca. 273.78 ± 1.68 Ma, the Laohugou Formation was deposited in the Anisian-Ladinian Stage, the andesitic lava in the Shuiquangou Formation erupted at ca. 238.56 ± 0.91 Ma, and the conglomerate in the Guojiadian Formation was deposited from ca. 170 ± 5 to 163.0 ± 2.2 Ma. Field observations and facies analyses demonstrate that the Laohugou, Shuiquangou and Dengzhangzi Formations predominantly consist of subaqueous debris flow deposits, subaerial fluvial deposits, and fan delta deposits while the Guojiadian Formation is generally composed of fluvial and subaerial mass-flow deposits that formed in braided channels. Here, we propose a more precise and comprehensive Triassic-Jurassic stratigraphic division scheme based on age constraints and facies analysis. With this new stratigraphic sequence, we compare the Mesozoic stratigraphic units in the study area with those in other basins in the Yanshan fold-thrust belt in terms of the lithological associations, regional unconformities and zircon U-Pb dating results. This comparison indicates that the Indosinian and Yanshanian movements exerted a far-reaching influence on the development and evolution of the Dengzhangzi and Guojiadian Basins in the study area, forming several important regional unconformities and syntectonic conglomeratic units. These new age data on the stratigraphy are of fundamental significance for understanding the Mesozoic tectonic evolution of Yanshan.

A series of six diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP) based conjugated polymers with a varying content of solubilizing perfluoroalkyl chains were synthesized. Based on a systematic investigation of the influence of the solvent on the photovoltaic performance, it is found that 1,6-diiodoperfluorohexane (IC6F12I) is an effective solvent additive to enhance the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of DPP polymers with perfluoroalkyl side chains. The polymers consist of thiazole-flanked DPP units that alternate along the main chain with varying ratios of thiophene (T) and perfluoroalkyl benzodithiophene (FBDT) units. The polymers possess high molecular weights, narrow band gaps and good crystalline properties. The DPP polymers were used as electron acceptors in bulk heterojunction solar cells with another DPP polymer as the electron donor. A solvent mixture of CHCl3 : 1-chloronaphthalene (1-CN) is found to provide the best PCE of 2.9% in non-fluorine based DPP polymer solar cells, but yields a low PCE of 0.52% for perfluoroalkyl-containing polymer solar cells. Perfluoroalkyl-containing polymer solar cells fabricated from CHCl3 with IC6F12I as the processing additive show a significantly improved PCE of 2.1%. The morphology analysis of the blend films reveals that IC6F12I as an additive improves the micro-phase separation between the polymer donor and acceptor, which results in enhanced charge generation.

Four typical diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP)-based conjugated polymers were used as electron donors in all-polymer solar cells (PSCs) with a naphthalenediimide-based polymer N2200 as the electron acceptor. The four DPP polymers have near-infrared absorption spectra up to 1000 nm and suitable energy levels for charge separation from donor to acceptor. DPP polymer : N2200 cells were found to have high open circuit voltages in comparison to fullerene-based solar cells but with low short circuit current densities and fill factors, so that the power conversion efficiencies of these cells were relatively low (0.45–1.7%). These blends relatively had balanced but low hole and electron mobilities from space charge limit current measurements, small surface roughness, and highly quenched photoluminescence (PL) from steady-state PL. These studies show that the low photocurrent and performance arise from the miscibility of the DPP and N2200 polymers, which enhances the charge recombination. The finding was further confirmed by grazing incidence X-ray diffraction and resonant soft X-ray scattering. All the PSCs based on DPP polymers were investigated, opening further studies based on these systems due to the broad absorption, high carrier mobilities and good crystalline properties of DPP polymers.

In this paper, we designed, synthesized, and characterized a set of non-fullerene small molecules based on bis(perylene diimide) with DACH bridge. Theoretical calculations make clear that the introduction of the DACH bridge into PPDI forms a U-shape framework, with pi–pi interactions between PDIs. We investigate the performances of non-fullerene solar cells comprising racemic and enantiomerically pure DACH-PPDIs as the electron acceptor and PTB7-Th as the electron donor. As a consequence, a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 4.68% is achieved with inverted device architecture. Furthermore, the device behaviour, morphological feature and charge transport properties were also investigated. It is a potential way to design highly efficient non-fullerene organic solar cell by tuning the structure of PDI to reach highly efficient photovoltaic performances.

Polymer nanowires based on two diketopyrrolopyrrole conjugated polymers with similar chemical structures are shown to have distinct "edge-on" and "face-on" configurations in addition to high well-balanced hole and electron mobilities of 5.47 and 5.33 cm(2) V(-1) s(-1) in field-effect transistors.

A regioregular terpolymer that combines electron-deficient diketopyrrolopyrrole and benzothiadiazole units with an electron-rich dithienopyrrole unit is presented. In solar cells, the terpolymer affords an open circuit voltage of 0.52 V and a power conversion efficiency of 3.7% with a spectral response up to 1050 nm.

A study of novel detecting methods of Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor at low light levels has been made. Three methods of images processing before slope estimating are presented: Linear Enhancing (LE), Exponential Enhancing (EE) and Fourier Spectrum Filtering (FSF). The idea of LE method is to time the image intensity with a special coefficient before slope estimation. The image points are powered by a selected exponent in EE method. The FSF method is based on the spectrum difference between signal and noise. Most of noise spectrum is filtered and the noise is restrained. The simulated and experimental results show that the LE method does not work effectively, and the other two methods can improve the slope estimation when the Signal-to-noise ratio is higher than 3.0. When the Signal-to-noise ratio is less than 3.0, especially when it is less than 1.0, the FSF is the only method that can overcome the readout noise of the CCD detector.

The term lignin is derived from lignum, which means plant wood. Plant wood are mainly composed of extractives, hemicellulose, cellulose, and lignin. The lignin is a cross-linked polymer, made of three phenylpropanoid precursors, p-coumaryl, synapyl, and conniferyl alcohols. It is the most abundant polymer in plant world and act mechanically as a natural glue to bind hemicellulose and cellulose. Lignin is amorphous, soluble in alkali, condenses with phenol and has high melting temperature. The function of lignin is to protect the carbohydrates of the biomass from degradation, thus provide stability. The chapter includes information on types of lignin, structure, isolation, degradation, and transformation in to market value chemicals. The application of lignin and lignin base monomers for synthesis of plastic, hydrogels, adhesives, chemicals, fuels and other value added materials at industrial scale.