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IntroductionPrior studies indicate that cigarette manufacturers have been interested for decades in developing a smokeless tobacco (SLT) product for smokers and non-users of SLT. The current study aims to assess a tobacco company's use of novel marketing strategies and intent to promote snus in the US as either a replacement or situational substitute for the cigarette.MethodsA Boolean search string was used to search R. J. Reynolds' (RJR) Records in UCSF's Truth Tobacco Industry Documents Library. A total of 358 documents, from 2005-2009, met our initial search criteria and were selected for their relevance to the marketing of Camel Snus. A content analysis was subsequently conducted using the Framework Method to identify themes and strategies for promoting Camel Snus.ResultsFour major themes about Camel Snus emerged from the documents: 1) promotion by third parties including retailers, snus ambassadors and secret shoppers, 2) expansion of the target population of SLT users to include female smokers and dual users of cigarettes and SLT, 3) emphasis on the difference between Camel Snus and other SLT, and 4) a shift from promoting the practical uses of Camel Snus to using emotional messages conveying freedom.ConclusionsThe findings align with other studies suggesting that RJR intended to market snus to non-users of SLT. The findings also reveal that RJR employed creative marketing strategies (e.g. snus ambassadors) and may have intended to promote snus as a situational substitute for the cigarette, as evidenced by the company's recruitment of dual tobacco users.

Global consumption of nonrenewable natural aggregate for construction activities is now becoming a significant concern. Reusing agricultural or marine-based wastes could offer a promising alternative to achieve natural aggregate conservation and a pollution-free environment. This study investigated the suitability of using crushed periwinkle shell (CPWS) as a reliable constituent material for sand and stone dust in producing hollow sandcrete blocks. The CPWS was used to partially substitute river sand and stone dust at 5, 10, 15 and 20% in sandcrete block mixes using a constant water–cement ratio (w/c) of 0.35. The weight, density and compressive strength of the hardened hollow sandcrete samples were determined after 28 days of curing along with the water absorption rate. Results showed an increase in the water absorbing rate of the sandcrete blocks as CPWS content increased. Mixes containing 5% and 10% CPWS substitute for sand with 100% stone dust surpassed the minimum targeted strength of 2.5 N/mm2. The compressive strength results suggested that CPWS is most suitable to be deployed as a partial substitute for sand as a constant stone dust material, thus imply that the construction industry can achieve sustainable construction with agro or marine-based wastes in hollow sandcrete production.

Non-tobacco blunt wraps (N-TBWs), which entered the marketplace in 2017, are being promoted as an alternative to traditional TBWs (e.g., cigarillos) for blunt smoking. The lack of studies on these novel products warrants an investigation. This study was the first to explore blunt smokers' perceptions about N-TBWs and the extent of product marketing on Twitter. A corpus of tweets from Twitter, posted between January 2017 and November 2021, were identified by a Boolean search string (N = 149,343), where 48,695 tweets were classified as relevant by a machine learning algorithm. These relevant tweets were further screened and labeled as promotional or organic based on product URLs, usernames, keywords, or hashtags. Topic modeling using Dirichlet Allocation was then employed for identifying latent patterns of words among relevant tweets. The Social Networking Potential (SNP) score was employed for identifying influential accounts. Most relevant tweets (89%) were organic, non-promotional expressions about N-TBWs. Account users who only posted non-promotional tweets had a significantly higher SNP than those who only posted promotional tweets. Yet, neither of the two groups of account users consisted of known celebrities. Topic modeling revealed three broad groups of topics (7 in total) denoting the attributes of hemp N-TBWs, interest in non-hemp N-TBWs, and product marketing. The large proportion of organic tweets is indicative of the nascency of N-TBWs, which will need to be marketed more extensively if they are to replace cigar products used by blunt smokers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the economic and ecologic importance of pine oleoresins, their rheology remains little explored. In this report we describe rheological properties of oleoresins produced by mature trees of four southern pines native to North America (loblolly, slash, longleaf, shortleaf). Results indicate that these oleoresins are structured fluids that exhibit viscoelastic behavior, but differ in flow behavior. Slash pine oleoresin exhibited Newtonian flow behavior while the oleoresin from the longleaf and shortleaf pines showed pseudoplastic behavior and the loblolly pine oleoresin showed Bingham fluid behavior with a yield stress of about 1.980 Pa. Temperature-dependent viscosities for the oleoresin samples studied were well described by the Arrhenius model, yielding flow activation energies ranging from 153.5 to 219.7 kJ/mol. The viscosity of the slash pine oleoresin sample was found to be less sensitive to temperature than that of the shortleaf or longleaf pine samples. The time-temperature superposition principle was successfully applied to pine oleoresins to show behavior over the temperature range of 25 - 65 °C typical for a thermorheologically simple system. Such behavior is consistent with the temperature dependent viscoelastic properties found for these complex fluids, and supports the effective use of rheological evaluations for describing physical properties of pine oleoresins.

The creep behavior and solid and melt linear viscoelasticity of novel polyamide 6 (PA6) nanocomposites reinforced with cellulose nanocrystals (CNCs) prepared via in situ anionic ring-opening polymerization (ROP) were investigated to accelerate research efforts to develop new polymeric materials with improved properties for lightweight, load-bearing applications. The obtained results showed that incorporation of relatively small amounts of, INTRODUCTION Polymer nanocomposites are an important class of polymer based materials that have found numerous applications in science, engineering and advanced technologies due to their unique properties that are attainable [...]

We report the effect of new sustainable inorganic phosphate glass (P-glass) flame retardants for polyamide 6,6 (PA6,6). Three P-glasses differing in chemical composition and glass transition temperature ([T.sub.g]) were prepared and their flame retardant effect on PA6,6 was studied by cone calorimetry, thermogravimetric analysis, and SEM-EDX. The effect of high and intermediate [T.sub.g] P-glasses on the thermal stability of PA6,6 was negligible as compared to that of the low [T.sub.g] P-glass due to the hygroscopic nature of the latter. However, the char formation was independent of the P-glass composition and was observed to increase by 30% in the presence of P-glass. The low [T.sub.g] P-glass composition (i.e., ILT-1) was found to be a promising flame retardant for PA6,6 at a concentration of up to 15% by weight. Cone calorimetry data showed that the ILT-1 decreased both the peak heat release rate and the total heat amount released from the PA6.6/ILT-1 hybrids, resulting in an efficient formation of a glassy char layer. In contrast to the intermediate and high [T.sub.g] P-glasses of this study, SEM-EDX indicated that the ILT-1 P-glass was well dispersed in the PA6,6 matrix to yield a typical droplet-inmatrix phase morphology in the melt-blended binary immiscible P-glass/PA6,6 hybrids., INTRODUCTION Engineered polyamides are used widely in electronic or electrical equipment, military and civil infrastructure applications because of their excellent mechanical properties, heat resistance, oil resistance [1, 2], and thermal [...]

The melt rheology of a low Tg tin phosphate glass [Pglass] has been studied with oscillatory shear flow experiments to accelerate efforts to melt process the glass with different organic polymers. The w dependence of the complex viscosity η* of the Pglass is easily predicted by a modified Rouse model with two relaxation times. The complex viscosity of the glass at different temperatures and frequencies can be superposed and described by the Arrhenius equation. At higher temperatures, the melt viscosity of the Pglass increased monotonically with time. This viscosity rise is thought to be due to sample crystallization. The Pglass was melt-mixed with two different thermoplastic polymers (low-density polyethylene and polystyrene) to produce unique hybrid materials with interesting microstructures.

Cyanide contamination in water and wastewater is ubiquitous, particularly in gold mining industries, where cyanide is commonly used to extract gold. It is constantly being monitored by collecting samples which are analyzed in the laboratory using traditional cyanide analysis, which requires complicated instrumentation, skilled analysts, and expensive equipment. Using the gold nanoparticle (AuNP)-decorated paper-based sensor employing Whatman Filter Paper (WFP) as a substrate, an automated process for cyanide monitoring with the aid of an assembled and improvised remotely controlled miniature boat was developed. The technology is equipped with a filtration system with automated water sample collection and preparation with an automatic paper sensor dispenser. Images of the collected wastewater samples are taken at different time intervals and are analyzed on their respective color spaces based on 8 mathematical models, each predicting the cyanide level of the water sample. The predictions are compared to the actual Ion- Selective Electrode (ISE) measurement, and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) values were calculated. The predictions at 165s using the Hue, Saturation, Value (HSV) color space exhibited the highest R2 of 0.85 and the lowest RMSE of 3.80 parts per million (ppm) with an average error of 3.40ppm. The predictions are sent to a database using Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM). The results suggest that the CYANanobot technology facilitates fast analysis time, circumvents the frequent instrument calibration, reduces operating costs, minimizes exposure to toxic cyanide-containing samples, and reduces person-to-person interaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study is aimed at investigating the feasibility of using facile forced assembly methods (temperature and shear strain-induced orientation of the dispersed phase) to create novel 'in situ' low-density polyethylene (LDPE) composites containing fibrillar inorganic phosphate glass (P-glass) reinforcing phase during the composite fabrication. Clearly, the experimental results show that unique thermo-rheological conditions exist under which the 'in situ' LDPE composites containing fibrillar P-glass with potential enhanced benefits can be prepared. DSC results showed that the P-glass has a moderate nucleating effect on the LDPE crystallization that restricts in situ deformation of the P-glass during the composite fabrication. Rheo-optical data showed that a 5% P-glass/95% LDPE hybrid composition, subjected to a shear rate of 20 [s.sup.-1] in the parallel plate configuration and 130 °C gave 'in situ' LDPE composite samples with the largest amount of P-glass fibers in the limited range of experimental conditions used. This study may spur interests in a better understanding of the potential for the gin situ' reinforcement of engineering plastics with inorganic P-glasses, at the molecular level, to produce novel gin situ' polymer composites with very high aspect ratios of the reinforcing inorganic phase. POLYM. ENG. SCI., 52:2090-2098, 2012. © 2012 Society of Plastics Engineers, INTRODUCTION One of the most spectacular developments in the field of materials engineering and processing is the development of in situ or self-reinforced ultrahigh modulus polymer composites containing oriented thermotropic [...]

The plastics industry expects a lot from advanced materials, but the relatively few that are commercially available cannot satisfy all applications and expectations. In this context, nanostructured hybrid organic-inorganic glass [...]