Multiple breakdown phenomena may take place when operating dielectric elastomers. Thermal breakdown, which occurs due to Joule heating, becomes of special importance when using multilayered stacks of dielectric elastomers, due to the large volume-to-surface-area-ratio. In this article, a 2D axisymmetric finite-element model of a multilayered stack of dielectric elastomers is set up in \comsol. Both the electro-thermal and electro-mechanical couplings are considered, allowing for determination of the onset of thermal breakdown. Simulation results show that an entrapped particle in the dielectric elastomer drastically reduces the possible number of layers in the stack. Furthermore, the possible number of layers is greatly affected by the ambient temperature and the applied voltage. The performance of three hyperelastic material models for modelling the elastomer deformation are compared, and it is established that the Gent model yields the most restrictive prediction of breakdown point, while the Ogden model yields the least restrictive estimation.

The flow characteristics of the blade unit of a tridimensional rotational flow sieve tray was investigated experimentally in this study. First, the flow patterns are defined under different liquid arrangement methods. They are bilateral film flow, continuous perforated flow, and dispersion-mixing flow in overflow distribution and film and jet flow and jet and mixed flow in spray distribution. Second, the time and frequency domain analysis of the differential pressure pulsation signal in the blade unit is carried out. The influence of perforation and mixing intensity on the flow pattern transition is clarified. Third, the rotational flow ratio of the gas-liquid phase is measured. The influence of the operating conditions on the distribution of the rotational and perforated flow for the gas-liquid phase is investigated. Finally, a prediction model for the rotational flow ratio is proposed. The prediction results agree well with the experimental data.

Background and Objective Clinical Practice Guidelines (CPGs) provide evidence-based recommendations to healthcare professionals, policy makers, patients and other stakeholders. Mexico is the biggest producer of CPGs in Latin America and Caribbean countries. The National Healthcare Technology Excellence Center (acronym in Spanish: CENETEC) is responsible for the CPG development, adaptation and update. The aim of this study was to assess the Mexican CPG quality and adherence to the GRADE framework. Study design We conducted a descriptive cross-sectional study of 86 CPGs representing all the CPGs produced by CENETEC between 2015 and 2017 and published in an online database called “Catalogo Maestro”. We performed quality assessment with the online AGREE II tool and assessed the reporting on the GRADE framework. Results Of the 86 CPGs, 34 were published in 2015, 21 in 2016 and 31 in 2017. The overall quality by AGREE II proved a median of 16.6% (Min 16.6%, Max 50%). Of the 86 CPGs, 25 (29%) used the GRADE framework; adherence to GRADE standards was, however, inconsistent and generally poor. Conclusion CPGs produced by CENETEC during this period had a low score by AGREE II standards and low adherence to the GRADE framework. A concerted initiative could rapidly improve CENETEC guidelines.

The European eel (Anguilla anguilla) is critically endangered throughout its distribution range. Knowledge about age distribution of future spawners (silver eels) is essential to monitor the status and contribute to the recovery of this species. Determination of age in anguillid eels is challenging, especially in eels from the northern part of the distribution area where growth is slow and age at maturation can be up to 30 years or more. Eels from the river Imsa in Norway have been monitored since 1975 and this reference time-series has been used to assess the stock at the European level. Population dynamics in this catchment were analyzed during the late 1980s by estimating ages on whole cleared otoliths. However, techniques for revealing annual increments on otoliths have evolved over the years sometimes yielding significant differences in age estimates. In this study, the historical otolith data were reanalyzed using a grinding and polishing method rather than reading the whole otolith. The new age estimates were considerably higher than the previous ones, sometimes by up to 29 years. Since the 1980s, mean age of silver eels only slightly increased (from 19 to 21 years in the 2010s). This was mainly due to the disappearance of younger silver eels (less than 15 years) in the 2010s. The new age estimates agreed with the steep decline in recruitment which occurred in the late 1980s in the Imsa catchment. Growth (30 mm y-1) has not changed since the 1980s, although density in the catchment has decreased. Revealing and reading age of slow growing eels remain a challenge but adding a measure of otolith reading uncertainty may improve age data collection and contribute to recovery measures for this species.

Turtles have been prominent subjects of analyses of sexual size dimorphism (SSD) owing to their mating system and habitat diversity. In prior studies, marine turtles were grouped with non-marine aquatic turtles (NMAT). This is odd because it is well-established that the marine environment imposes a distinct selective milieu on body form of vagile vertebrates, driven by convergent adaptations for energy-efficient propulsion and drag reduction. We generated a comprehensive database of adult marine turtle body size (38,569 observations across all species), which we then used to evaluate both the magnitude of SSD in marine turtles and how it compares to SSD in NMAT. We find that marine turtles are not sexually size dimorphic, whereas NMAT typically exhibit female-biased SSD. We argue that the reason for this difference is the sustained long-distance swimming that characterises marine turtle ecology, which entails significant energetic costs incurred by both sexes. Hence, the ability of either sex to allocate proportionately more to growth than the other is likely constrained, meaning that sexual differences in growth and resultant body size are not possible. Consequently, lumping marine turtles with NMAT dilutes the statistical signature of different kinds of selection on SSD and should be avoided in future studies.

Introduction of a heterocyclic ring and an amino-ethyl-amino group to D-A type photosensitive dyes can modulate the lifetime of the charge separation generated in the D-A dyes as well as their electronic and UV-Vis absorption properties. Here we performed DFT and TDDFT calculations to study eleven derivatives of a triphenylamine-pyrimidine, MTPA-Pyc, in order to improve the performance of MTPA-Pyc as solar cell sensitizers. Five heterocyclic rings and an amino-ethyl-amino group were introduced on the styryl moiety of MTPA-Pyc. The results show that introduction of heterocyclic rings generally causes an absorption red-shift, but absorption intensity is reduced due to the increase of dihedral angle between the donor and acceptor. Further introduction of an amino-ethyl-amino group to these dyes with a heterocyclic ring modification disrupts the conjugation between donor and acceptor, which does not benefit the absorption but may have potential to increase the lifetime of charge separation of the dyes. This work identified two out of eleven dyes that have the best potential for solar cell applications.

Sickness behaviour is a taxonomically-widespread coordinated set of behavioural changes that in- creases shelter-seeking while reducing levels of general activity, as well as food (anorexia) and water (adipsia) consumption, when fighting infection by pathogens and disease. The leading hypothesis ex- plaining such sickness-related shifts in behaviour is the energy conservation hypothesis. This hypothe- sis argues that sick (i.e. immune-challenged) animals reduce energetic expenditure in order have more energy to fuel an immune response, which in some vertebrates, also includes producing an energetically- expensive physiological fever. We experimentally tested the hypothesis that an immune-challenge with lipopolysaccharide (LPS) will cause Gryllus firmus field crickets to reduce their activity, increase shelter- use and avoid foods that interfere with an immune response (i.e. fat) while preferring a diet thats fuel an immune response (i.e. protein). We found little evidence of sickness behaviour in Gryllus firmus as immune-challenged individuals did not reduce their activity or increase their shelter-seeking. Neither did we observe changes in feeding or drinking behaviour nor a preference for protein or avoidance of lipids. Males tended to use shelters less than females but no other behaviours differed between the sexes. The lack of sickness behaviour in our study might reflect the fact that invertebrates do not possess energetically-expensive physiological fever as part of their immune response. Therefore, there is little reason to conserve energy via reduced activity or increased shelter use when immune-challenged.

We present a new family of fast and robust methods for the calculation of the vapor-liquid equilibrium at isobaric-isothermal (PT-flash), isochoric-isothermal (VT-flash), isenthalpic-isobaric (HP-flash), and isoenergetic-isochoric (UV-flash) conditions. The framework is provided by formulating phase-equilibrium conditions for multi-component mixtures in an effectively reduced space based on the molar specific value of the recently introduced volume function derived from the Helmholtz free energy. The proposed algorithmic implementation can fully exploit the optimum quadratic convergence of a Newton method with the analytical Jacobian matrix. This paper provides all required exact analytic expressions for the general cubic equation of state. Computational results demonstrate the effectivity and efficiency of the new methods. Compared to conventional methods, the proposed reduced-space iteration leads to a considerable speed-up as well as to improved robustness and better convergence behavior near the spinodal and coexistence curves of multi-component mixtures, where the preconditioning by the reduction method is most effective.

Reproductive character displacement is a pattern whereby sympatric lineages diverge more in reproductive character morphology than allopatric lineages. This pattern has been observed in many plant species, but comparably few have sought to disentangle underlying mechanisms. Here, in a hyperdiverse lineage of Neotropical plants (Ruellia; Acanthaceae), we present evidence of reproductive character displacement in a macroevolutionary framework (i.e., among species) and document mechanistic underpinnings. In a series of inter-specific hand pollinations in a controlled glasshouse environment, we found that crosses between species that differed more in overall flower size, particularly in style length, were significantly less likely to produce viable seeds. Further, species pairs that failed to set seed were more likely to have sympatric distributions in nature. While these findings could result from competition for pollinators or differential fusion of sympatric populations based on variable crossability, our results instead lend support for a role of reinforcement whereby selection has acted to increase reproductive barriers between sympatric species, especially given divergence in floral traits less likely to be under selection by pollinators (i.e., style length). Our results add to growing evidence that character displacement contributes to exceptional floral diversity of angiosperms.

Water transit time and young water fraction are important metrics for characterizing catchment hydrologic function and understanding solute transport. Hydrological and biogeochemical processes in karst environments are strongly controlled by heterogenous fracture-conduit networks. Quantifying the spatio-temporal variability of water transit time and young water fractions in such heterogeneous hydrogeological systems is fundamental linking discharge and water quality dynamics in the karst critical zone. We used a tracer-aided hydrological model to track the fluxes of water parcels that entered a karst catchment as rainfall, time-stamping each hour of rain input individually. Using this approach, the variability of transit times and water age distributions were estimated in the main landscape units in the karst catchment of Chenqi in Guizhou Province, Southwest China. The estimated mean young water (i.e <~2 months old) fractions were 0.39, 0.31 and 0.10 for output fluxes from the hillslope unit, catchment outlet and slow flow reservoirs (matrix and small fractures), respectively. Marked seasonal variability in sources of runoff generation and associated hydrological connectivity between different conceptual stores were the main drivers of young water fraction dynamics in each landscape unit. The water age and travel time distributions were strongly influenced by the water storage dynamics reflecting catchment wetness conditions. Even though the contribution of young water to runoff was greater, the older water turnover was generally accelerated at moderately high flows during wet season.

Time-dependent density functional theory approach implemented at hybrid-B3LYP, GGA-PBE and DFTB levels of theory was used to model photoinjection in organic-dye/TiO2 quantum-dot to explore the prospects of improvement of DSSC. The photosensitizer used in this study consisted of six carbazole based organic dyes having acceptor as cyanoacrilic acid group and oligothiophene π-bridge spacer. The modifications were made in the dyes by increasing length of the spacer by adding thiophene and oxadiazole rings at different positions of the donor-acceptor bridge. The structural variations appeared to alter the electronic and optical properties of dyes studied via energy levels and excitation spectra. The UV-Vis spectra calculated for all the dyes in solvents exhibited a red shift in spectral peaks with increase in polarity of the solvents. The findings of the study pointed towards photoinjection of indirect nature studied in dye-(TiO2)96 complex for six different dyes. The substitution of oxadiazole ring in center and addition of a thiophene ring at the edge of the spacer produced two dyes which exhibited lowest injection energies of 0.11eV and 0.17 eV along with the regeneration energies of 1.18 eV and 1.12 eV respectively. The dyes reported herein may have promising applications in photoanode for enhancing the performance of DSSC.

In this paper, the Shannon entropy and Fisher information are studied for the screened Kratzer potential model (SKP). We calculated the position and momentum entropies for the screened Kratzer potential for its ground states as well as the first excited state. Our result shows that the sum of the position and momentum entropies satisfies the lower bound Berkner, Bialynicki–Birula and Mycieslki (BBM) inequality. Also, our results showed that decreasing Shannon entropy in the position space was complemented with an increasing Shannon entropy in the momentum space. Similarly, we evaluated for Fisher information and show that the Stam, Cramer-Rao inequalities are satisfied. The squeezing phenomena were also observed for certain values of the screening parameter α.

Alanine is a transfer standard dosimeter using in gamma-ray and electron beam calibration. One of the important factor affecting its dosimetric response is amount of humidity which can deviate the dosimetry expert from the exact value of absorbed doses. Ab initio molecular dynamics calculations were performed to determine the environmental effects on the EPR parameters of L-α-Alanine radicals in acidic and alkaline solutions. Similar to the closed-shell amino acid molecule alanine, the zwitterionic form of alanine radical is the stable form in the gas phase while the non-zwitterionic neutral alanine radical is not a stable structure. Geometric and EPR parameters of radicals in both gas and solution phases are found to be dependent on hydrogen bonding of water molecules with the polar groups and by dynamic solvation. Calculations on the optimized free radicals in the gas phase revealed that for neutral radical, hydrogen bonding to water molecules drives a decrease in the magnitudes of g-tensor components gxx and gyy without affecting neither gzz component nor the HFCCs. For the transfer from the gas to solution phase of the alanine radical anion is accompanied with an increase in the spin density on the carboxylic group’s oxygen atoms. However, for the neutral radical, this transfer from gas to solution phase is accompanied with the decrease in the spin density on oxygen atoms. Calculated isotropic HFCCs and g-tensor of all radicals were in good agreement with their experimental counterparts in both acidic and alkaline solutions, which enhances the confidence in our calculated results.

Background: Lack of time has consistently been reported as a major barrier to effective research evidence-uptake into clinical practice. There has been no research to our knowledge that explores time as a barrier within the Transtheoretical model of Stages of Change (SoC), to better understand the processes of physiotherapists’ uptake of clinical practice guidelines (CPG). This paper explores the concept of lack of time as a barrier for CPG uptake for physiotherapists at different SoC. Methods: A 6-step process is presented to determine the best-fit SoC for 31 physiotherapy interviewees. This process used an amalgamation of interview findings and socio-demographic data, which was layered onto the SoC and previously identified time-barriers to CPG uptake (few staff; high workload; access to CPGs; evidence-based practice as priority in clinical practice; “time is money” attitude; and knowledge on the use of CPGs). Results: The analysis process highlighted the complexities of assigning individuals to a SoC. A model of time management for better CPG uptake is proposed which is a novel approach to assist evidence implementalists and clinicians alike to determine how to progress through the SoC and barriers to improve CPG uptake. Conclusions: To the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt at exploring the construct of (lack of) time for CPG-uptake in relation to the physiotherapists’ readiness to behaviour change. This study shows that ‘lack of time’ is a euphemism for quite different barriers, which map to different stages of readiness to embrace current best evidence into physiotherapy practice. By understanding what is meant by ‘lack of time’, it may indicate specific support required by physiotherapists at different stages of changing these behaviours.

Technological advancements in the past few decades have made it possible to manufacture nanomaterials at large scale and ENPs are increasingly found in consumer products such as cosmetics, sports products and LED displays. A large amount of these ENPs are in wastewater and potentially impact the performance of wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). One important function of the WWTP is nitrification, which is carried out by the actions of two groups of bacteria, ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria (NOB). Since most ENPs are found to have or are designed to have antimicrobial activities, it is a legitimate concern that ENPs entering WWTPs may have negative impacts on nitrification. In this paper, the effects of ENPs on nitrification is discussed, focusing mainly on autotrophic nitrification by AOBs and NOBs. This review also covers ENPs effects on ANAMMOX. Generally, nitrifiers in pure and mixed culture can be inhibited by a variety of ENPs, but stress response mechanisms may attenuate toxicity. Long-term studies demonstrated that a wide range of NPs can cause severe deterioration of AOBs and/or NOBs when the influent concentration exceeded an inhibition threshold. Proposed mechanisms include the generation of reactive oxygen species, dissolved metals, physical disruption of cell membranes, bacterial engulfment, and intracellular accumulation of ENPs. Future research needs are also discussed.

Homologous recombination over large genomic regions is difficult to achieve due to low efficiencies. Here, we report the successful engineering of a humanized mTert allele, hmTert, in the mouse genome by replacing an 18.1-kb genomic region around the mTert gene with a recombinant fragment of over 45.5-kb, using homologous recombination facilitated by the Crispr/Cas9 technology, in mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs). In our experiments, with specific sites of DNA double strand breaks (DSBs) by Crispr/Cas9 system, the homologous recombination efficiency was up to 11% and 16% in two mESC lines TC1 and v6.5, respectively. Overall, we obtained a total of 27 mESC clones with heterozygous hmTert/mTert alleles and 3 clones with homozygous hmTert alleles. DSBs induced by Crispr/Cas9 cleavages also caused high rates of genomic DNA deletions and mutations at small guide RNA (sgRNA) target sites. Our results indicated the Crispr/Cas9 system significantly increased the efficiency of homologous recombination-mediated gene editing over a large genomic region in mammal cells, but also inherently caused mutations at unedited target sites. Overall, this strategy provides an efficient and feasible way for manipulating large chromosomal regions.

The available pneumococcal conjugate vaccines provide protection against only those serotypes that are included in the vaccine, which leads to a selective pressure and serotype replacement in the population. An alternative low-cost, safe and serotype-independent vaccine was developed based on a non-encapsulated pneumococcus strain. This study evaluates process intensification to improve biomass production and shows for the first time the use of perfusion-batch with cell recycling for a bacterial vaccine production. Batch, fed-batch and perfusion-batch were performed at 10 L scale using a complex animal component-free culture medium. Cells were harvested at the highest optical density, concentrated and washed using microfiltration or centrifugation to compare cell separation methods. Higher biomass was achieved using perfusion-batch, which removes lactate while retaining cells. The biomass produced in perfusion-batch would represent at least 4-fold greater number of doses per cultivation than in the previously described batch process. Each strategy yielded similar vaccines in terms of quality as evaluated by Western blot and animal immunization assays, indicating that, so far, perfusion-batch is the best strategy for the intensification of pneumococcal whole cell vaccine production, since it can be integrated to the cell separation process keeping the same vaccine quality.

Background: Most studies on the transition from pediatric to adult care focus on practices at a single institution. We examine the transition for young adults with type 1 diabetes across an entire Canadian province with a small, mostly rural population: Newfoundland and Labrador (NL). Our aim is to determine a comprehensive picture of how transition is occurring in one jurisdiction and explore potential methods for improvement. Methods: A provincial diabetes database and hospital admission data were reviewed for a cohort of young adults who transitioned into adult care to determine the number of transfers occurring, patient characteristics, and the number of diabetes-related hospitalizations. Semi-structured interviews with pediatric and adult diabetes providers were conducted to determine the current process of transition and identify ways for improvement, including the potential role of family physicians. Results: Between 2008 and 2013, 93 patients with type 1 diabetes transitioned into adult care. Fifteen interviews were conducted across the province’s four regional health authorities. Various models of transition care are being employed, reflecting staff and resource availability. While no structured transition program was identified, many providers were comfortable with their current transition processes. Suggested improvements included more structured processes, shared educational resources, and a dedicated transfer clinic. Conclusions: In a province with a relatively small number of patients who transition out of pediatric care annually, we found different approaches for transitioning them into adult care, but this variation may not negatively impact patient outcomes.