Progress in pilot, large-scale projects as an inducement for CCUS deployment

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Malnutrition secondary to gastrojejunal stricture after biliopancreatic diversion

Context: Bariatric surgery has beneficial effects on obesity and associated comorbidities such as glycaemic control in type 2 diabetes, dyslipidaemia, hypertension, and renal and hepatic function. Nevertheless, this surgery is not free of complications and possible side effects due to restrictive and/or malabsorptive related components. Case description: We report the case of a 60-year-old woman whose past medical history included morbid obesity, hypertension and Scopinaro biliopancreatic diversion (BPD) with duodenal switch in 1998. In 2015, she attended the emergency department hypotensive with bad general condition and reporting chronic constitutional symptoms. A wide variety of tests were performed including endoscopic studies as her symptoms were not immediately correlated with the BPD surgery. Finally, she was diagnosed from gastrojejunal stricture which caused her severe malnutrition. The patient underwent successful surgical management. Discussion: BPD is one of the most effective surgical procedures for obesity, with an overall 5-year loss of excess body weight higher than 72%. Nonetheless, it is associated with long-term complications such as protein malnutrition and vitamin deficiencies due to malabsorption. Being surgically challenging, with high risk of nutritional complications and lifelong needed for the follow-up, BPD is rarely performed nowadays. Conclusions: Bariatric Surgery is a well-known effective therapeutic measure to improve obesity and cardiovascular related disease. However, this case highlights the importance of robust multidisciplinary lifelong surgical and medical follow-up in all BPD patients. BPD complications can be minimised and recognised early with patient and healthcare staff education on the importance of lifetime follow-up and adherence to dietary and supplement regimes

Grindability and combustion behavior of coal and torrefied biomass blends

Biomass samples (pine, black poplar and chestnut woodchips) were torrefied to improve their grindability before being combusted in blends with coal. Torrefaction temperatures between 240 and 300 °C and residence times between 11 and 43 min were studied. The grindability of the torrefied biomass, evaluated from the particle size distribution of the ground sample, significantly improved compared to raw biomass. Higher temperatures increased the proportion of smaller-sized particles after grinding. Torrefied chestnut woodchips (280 °C, 22 min) showed the best grinding properties. This sample was blended with coal (5–55 wt.% biomass). The addition of torrefied biomass to coal up to 15 wt.% did not significantly increase the proportion of large-sized particles after grinding. No relevant differences in the burnout value were detected between the coal and coal/torrefied biomass blends due to the high reactivity of the coal. NO and SO2 emissions decreased as the percentage of torrefied biomass in the blend with coal increased.This work was part of the subcontracted contribution of INCAR to a project carried out by EDP Spain with the financial support from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and acting IDEPA (Economic Development Agency of the Principality of Asturias) as research funding agency (Ref.: IDE/2013/000233). The authors thank A. J. Martín, member of the PrEM group at INCAR-CSIC, for his contribution.Peer reviewe

Processing of preribosomal RNA in Saccharomyces cerevisiae

Most, if not all RNAs, are transcribed as precursors that require processing to gain functionality. Ribosomal RNAs (rRNA) from all organisms undergo both exo- and endonucleolytic processing. Also, in all organisms, rRNA processing occurs inside large preribosomal particles and is coupled to nucleotide modification, folding of the precursor rRNA (pre-rRNA), and assembly of the ribosomal proteins (r-proteins). In this review, we focus on the processing pathway of pre-rRNAs of cytoplasmic ribosomes in the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae, without doubt, the organism where this pathway is best characterized. We summarize the current understanding of the rRNA maturation process, particularly focusing on the pre-rRNA processing sites, the enzymes responsible for the cleavage or trimming reactions and the different mechanisms that monitor and regulate the pathway. Strikingly, the overall order of the various processing steps is reasonably well conserved in eukaryotes, perhaps reflecting common principles for orchestrating the concomitant events of pre-rRNA processing and ribosome assembly

Procedimiento de obtención de un adsorbente que utiliza residuos de café postconsumo y su utilización para la adsorción de CO2

La presente invención se refiere a un procedimiento de obtención de un material adsorbente con capacidad para adsorber CO2 , que utiliza residuos de café postconsumo. El procedimiento de obtención comprende el secado del residuo, su conformación, en ausencia de ligantes, y su activación térmica en presencia de un agente activante, que preferentemente es CO2 . Las características texturales y de densidad del material obtenido por el procedimiento de la invención, que también se protege, lo convierten en un candidato ideal para la adsorción de CO2 , y preferentemente en la captura de CO2 postcombustión.Peer reviewedConsejo Superior de Investigaciones CientíficasR Informe sobre el estado de la técnica publicado separadament

Comparison between the reactivity of coal and synthetic coal models

A mixture of carbon compounds was pyrolysed under an inert atmosphere at different temperatures in a fixed bed reactor. The resultant chars were characterised in terms of texture and thermal behaviour. Textural characterisation of the chars was carried out by N2 and CO2 adsorption isotherms at −196 and 0 °C, respectively. Char isothermal reactivity in air at 500 °C, and in CO2 at 1000 °C, was performed in a thermogravimetric analyser (TGA). Temperature-programmed combustion tests under 20% oxygen in argon were also performed in the TGA linked to a mass spectrometer (TGA/MS). The results showed that char textural properties do not always relate well to their reactivity. Not only do physical properties (e.g. surface area, porosity) but also chemical properties (e.g. active sites concentration and distribution) play an important role in the reaction of carbonaceous material and oxidant. On the other hand, in terms of chemical composition the chars obtained from the mixture of carbon compounds were very similar to the chars produced under the same experimental conditions by a high volatile bituminous coal. The fact that carbon compounds are well known makes it easier to obtain knowledge about the functional groups present in synthetic char, and to study the mechanisms of heterogeneous reactions such as the reduction of NO with carbon.Peer reviewe

Experimental and Simulation Study of Adsorption in Postcombustion Conditions Using a Microporous Biochar. 2. H2O, CO2, and N2 Adsorption

The adsorption behavior of humid mixtures that are representative of postcombustion conditions on a microporous biochar was evaluated. The adsorption isotherms of H2O(v) were measured at 30, 50, and 70 °C up to the saturation pressure and fitted to the extended Cooperative Multimolecular Sorption (CMMS) model. Dynamic experiments were carried out in a fixed-bed adsorption unit with mixtures of N2, CO2, and H2O(v). Experimental results indicate that H2O is little affected by CO2 adsorption. On the other hand, the CO2 adsorption capacity can be reduced by the adsorption of H2O. The extent of this reduction is dependent on the amount of H2O adsorbed, which, in turn, is strongly dependent on the relative humidity of the gas phase and the adsorption time. A dynamic fixed-bed adsorption model that makes use of Ideal Adsorbed Solution (IAS) theory has been shown to be adequate to describe the adsorption behavior of CO2 from the ternary mixtures in the full range of conditions evaluated.Work carried out with financial support from the HiPerCap Project of the European Union 7th Framework Programme (FP7) (2007-2013; Grant Agreement No. 60855).Peer reviewe

Kinetic models comparison for non-isothermal steam gasification of coal–biomass blend chars

The non-isothermal thermogravimetric method (TGA) was applied to a bituminous coal (PT), two types of biomass, chestnut residues (CH) and olive stones (OS), and coal–biomass blends in order to investigate their thermal reactivity under steam. Fuel chars were obtained by pyrolysis in a fixed-bed reactor at a final temperature of 1373 K for 30 min. The gasification tests were carried out by thermogravimetric analysis from room temperature to 1373 K at heating rates of 5, 10 and 15 K min−1. After blending, no significant interactions were detected between PT and CH during co-gasification, whereas deviations from the additive behaviour were observed in the PT–OS blend. However, for the two coal–biomass blends, the gasification behaviour resembled that of the individual coal, as this component constituted the larger proportion of the blend. The temperature-programmed reaction (TPR) technique was employed at three different heating rates to analyze noncatalytic gas–solid reactions. Three nth-order representative gas–solid models, the volumetric model (VM), the grain model (GM) and the random pore model (RPM) were applied in order to describe the reactive behaviour of the chars during steam gasification. From these models, the kinetic parameters were determined. The best model for describing the reactivity of the PT, PT–CH and PT–OS samples was the RPM model. VM was the model that best fitted the CH sample, whereas none of the models were suitable for the OS sample.This work was carried out with financial support from the Spanish MICINN (Project PS- 120000-2006-3, ECOCOMBOS), and co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund, ERDF.Peer reviewe

The eukaryote-specific N-terminal extension of ribosomal protein S31 contributes to the assembly and function of 40S ribosomal subunits

The archaea-/eukaryote-specific 40S-ribosomal-subunit protein S31 is expressed as an ubiquitin fusion protein in eukaryotes and consists of a conserved body and a eukaryote-specific N-terminal extension. In yeast, S31 is a practically essential protein, which is required for cytoplasmic 20S pre-rRNA maturation. Here, we have studied the role of the N-terminal extension of the yeast S31 protein. We show that deletion of this extension partially impairs cell growth and 40S subunit biogenesis and confers hypersensitivity to aminoglycoside antibiotics. Moreover, the extension harbours a nuclear localization signal that promotes active nuclear import of S31, which associates with pre-ribosomal particles in the nucleus. In the absence of the extension, truncated S31 inefficiently assembles into pre-40S particles and two subpopulations of mature small subunits, one lacking and another one containing truncated S31, can be identified. Plasmid-driven overexpression of truncated S31 partially suppresses the growth and ribosome biogenesis defects but, conversely, slightly enhances the hypersensitivity to aminoglycosides. Altogether, these results indicate that the N- terminal extension facilitates the assembly of S31 into pre-40S particles and contributes to the optimal translational activity of mature 40S subunits but has only a minor role in cytoplasmic cleavage of 20S pre-rRNA at site D