Viable Production of Diesel From Non-Recyclable Waste Plastics

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
John William Bordynuik
Keyword(s):  
Process Development ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Waste Plastics ◽  
Liquid Hydrocarbons ◽  
Waste Plastic ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Grand Island ◽  
Barriers And Challenges

The art of refining liquid hydrocarbons (crude oil) into diesel, gasoline, and fuel oils was commercially scaled decades ago. Unfortunately, refineries are technologically limited to accepting only a very narrow range of liquid hydrocarbons with very specific properties and minimal contaminates. Unrecyclable, hydrocarbon-based waste is a significant environmental problem increasing every year. According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2010 Facts and Figures report, over 92% of waste plastic is not recycled and with a growth rate of approximately 8% per year, there exists a critical need for a viable and environmentally sound, general purpose hydrocarbon-based recycling process. Hydrocarbon streams that fall outside of accepted refinery standards have traditionally been landfilled or melted into products of low value. The barriers and challenges are so great that previous attempts to refine waste plastics into fuel resulted in unviable batch-based machines producing low-value, unstable mixed fuels. However, over the course of three years JBI, Inc. (“JBI”) has broken through these barriers and has designed and built a viable commercial-scale continuous refinery capable of processing a wide-range of hydrocarbon-based waste into ASTM specification fuels. Research and testing of scale-up through 1-gallon, 3000 gallon, multi-kiln, and 40 ton/day processors took place in a plant in Niagara Falls, NY. Technical challenges encountered and lessons learned during process development will be explained in detail. In 2009, our technology was “molecularly audited” by IsleChem, LLC (“IsleChem”) of Grand Island, NY and in 2012, the full-scale plant was viably validated by SAIC Energy, Environment & Infrastructure, LLC (“SAIC”). Numerous sources of waste plastic and users of the resulting fuel products conducted extensive audits of the technology, process, and plant. For the purpose of this paper, processing of waste plastics will be discussed in detail; however, this technology can be applied to other waste hydrocarbon-based materials such as contaminated monomers, waste oils, lubricants and other composite waste streams.

scholarly journals Improving mental health and psychosocial wellbeing in humanitarian settings: reflections on research funded through R2HC

2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Wietse A. Tol ◽  
Alastair Ager ◽  
Cecile Bizouerne ◽  
Richard Bryant ◽  
Rabih El Chammay ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
Psychosocial Support ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Research Projects ◽  
Psychosocial Needs ◽  
Knowledge Gaps ◽  
Humanitarian Settings ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Major knowledge gaps remain concerning the most effective ways to address mental health and psychosocial needs of populations affected by humanitarian crises. The Research for Health in Humanitarian Crisis (R2HC) program aims to strengthen humanitarian health practice and policy through research. As a significant portion of R2HC’s research has focused on mental health and psychosocial support interventions, the program has been interested in strengthening a community of practice in this field. Following a meeting between grantees, we set out to provide an overview of the R2HC portfolio, and draw lessons learned. In this paper, we discuss the mental health and psychosocial support-focused research projects funded by R2HC; review the implications of initial findings from this research portfolio; and highlight four remaining knowledge gaps in this field. Between 2014 and 2019, R2HC funded 18 academic-practitioner partnerships focused on mental health and psychosocial support, comprising 38% of the overall portfolio (18 of 48 projects) at a value of approximately 7.2 million GBP. All projects have focused on evaluating the impact of interventions. In line with consensus-based recommendations to consider a wide range of mental health and psychosocial needs in humanitarian settings, research projects have evaluated diverse interventions. Findings so far have both challenged and confirmed widely-held assumptions about the effectiveness of mental health and psychosocial interventions in humanitarian settings. They point to the importance of building effective, sustained, and diverse partnerships between scholars, humanitarian practitioners, and funders, to ensure long-term program improvements and appropriate evidence-informed decision making. Further research needs to fill knowledge gaps regarding how to: scale-up interventions that have been found to be effective (e.g., questions related to integration across sectors, adaptation of interventions across different contexts, and optimal care systems); address neglected mental health conditions and populations (e.g., elderly, people with disabilities, sexual minorities, people with severe, pre-existing mental disorders); build on available local resources and supports (e.g., how to build on traditional, religious healing and community-wide social support practices); and ensure equity, quality, fidelity, and sustainability for interventions in real-world contexts (e.g., answering questions about how interventions from controlled studies can be transferred to more representative humanitarian contexts).

Establishing a Contingency Plan to Improve Patient Comfort During Peripherally Inserted Central Catheter Insertions: A Quality Improvement Effort

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott T. Wagoner ◽  
Jamie Lorenc ◽  
Elizabeth Edmunson ◽  
Jennifer V. Schurman
Keyword(s):  
Process Development ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Patient Comfort ◽  
Quality Improvement Effort ◽  
Patients At Risk ◽  
Future Work ◽  
Improve Patient ◽  
State Scale

Highlights Abstract Background: Negative outcomes can occur when painful experiences related to needle procedures are not addressed. Patients at the institution in this study were not demonstrating sufficient levels of comfort during peripherally inserted central catheters (PICC) placements, so formal assessment of discomfort or distress began via the Pediatric Sedation State Scale (PSSS), and an enhanced approach to comfort planning, built around the Comfort Promise, was implemented. Over 1 year, we aimed to increase the percent of patients meeting sufficient comfort during PICC insertions by our Vascular Access Team (VAT) from 54% to 65%. Methods: Initially, VAT staff were educated on use of the PSSS and began routinely charting the highest score obtained during each PICC placement. Interventions were delivered concurrently and included (1) changing the VAT culture, (2) process development, (3) consensus building and scale up, and (4) information system modifications. Results: During the project period, 421 PICC insertions were completed. From baseline to the last 8 months, the percent of patients rated as experiencing sufficient comfort (PSSS = 2–3) during PICC placement increased from 54% to 74%, with the percent of patients experiencing significant discomfort or distress (PSSS = 4–5) decreasing from 45% to under 7%. Conclusions: Success in this project required a culture change. Building consensus by engaging others and integrating with the processes, preferences, and priorities of each area was key. Future work will focus on increasing use of all Comfort Promise bundle elements, identifying patients at risk for escalation, and taking a long-term view to comfort planning, as well as applying lessons learned to other needle procedures.

scholarly journals Clean manufacturing powered by biology: how Amyris has deployed technology and aims to do it better

2020 ◽  
Vol 47 (11) ◽  
pp. 965-975 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul Hill ◽  
Kirsten Benjamin ◽  
Binita Bhattacharjee ◽  
Fernando Garcia ◽  
Joshua Leng ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Data Science ◽  
Process Development ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Strain Engineering ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Product Portfolio ◽  
Fermentation Products ◽  
The World ◽  
Clean Manufacturing ◽  
Transfer Procedures

AbstractAmyris is a fermentation product company that leverages synthetic biology and has been bringing novel fermentation products to the market since 2009. Driven by breakthroughs in genome editing, strain construction and testing, analytics, automation, data science, and process development, Amyris has commercialized nine separate fermentation products over the last decade. This has been accomplished by partnering with the teams at 17 different manufacturing sites around the world. This paper begins with the technology that drives Amyris, describes some key lessons learned from early scale-up experiences, and summarizes the technology transfer procedures and systems that have been built to enable moving more products to market faster. Finally, the breadth of the Amyris product portfolio continues to expand; thus the steps being taken to overcome current challenges (e.g. automated strain engineering can now outpace the rest of the product commercialization timeline) are described.

scholarly journals Process development for scale-up production of a therapeutic L-asparaginase by Streptomyces brollosae NEAE-115 from shake flasks to bioreactor

2019 ◽  
Vol 9 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Noura El-Ahmady El-Naggar ◽  
Hassan Moawad ◽  
Nancy M. El-Shweihy ◽  
Sara M. El-Ewasy ◽  
Islam A. Elsehemy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Cell Growth ◽  
Enzyme Production ◽  
Process Development ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Statistical Design ◽  
Inoculum Size ◽  
Stirred Tank Bioreactor ◽  
Starchy Food ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Face Centered

Abstract L-asparaginase is a promising enzyme that has a wide range of significant applications including cancer therapy and starchy food industries. The statistical design of Plackett–Burman and face centered central composite design were employed to optimize L-asparaginase production by Streptomyces brollosae NEAE-115. As a result, a medium of the following formula is the optimum for producing L-asparaginase in the culture filtrate of Streptomyces brollosae NEAE-115: Dextrose 2 g, starch 20 g, L-asparagine 10 g, KNO3 1 g, K2HPO4 1 g, MgSO4.7H2O 0.5 g, NaCl 0.1 g, pH 7, fermentation period 7 days, temperature 30 °C, inoculum size 4%, v/v, agitation speed 150 rpm and inoculum age 48 h. The kinetics of cell growth, carbohydrates consumption and L- asparaginase production were studied in 7-L stirred tank bioreactor under different cultivation conditions. A significant increase in both cell growth and carbohydrate consumption was observed as the stirring speed increased from 200 to 600 rpm under uncontrolled pH. The highest L- asparaginase activity of 108.46 U/mL was obtained after 96 h at 400 rpm. On the other hand, the specific enzyme production (Yp/x) under uncontrolled pH reached its maximal value of about 20.3 U/mg cells. Further improvement of enzyme production was attained by controlling pH at 7 using the selected stirring speed of 400 rpm. Enzyme production of 162.11 U/mL obtained from the controlled pH cultures exceeded this value gained from uncontrolled pH (108.46 U/mL) by about 50%.

A Comprehensive Review on Blast Furnace

2018 ◽  
Vol 4 (11) ◽  
pp. 6
Author(s):  
Upendra Kumar ◽  
Avinash Patidar ◽  
Bhupendra Koshti
Keyword(s):  
Blast Furnace ◽  
Metallurgical Coke ◽  
Waste Plastics ◽  
Blast Furnaces ◽  
Liquid Hydrocarbons ◽  
Comprehensive Review ◽  
Global Performance ◽  
Flow Heat ◽  
And Control ◽  
Recycled Waste

The design and control of blast furnace (BF) ironmaking must be optimized in order to be competitive and sustainable, particularly under the more and more demanding and tough economic and environmental conditions. To achieve this, it is necessary to understand the complex multiphase flow, heat and mass transfer, and global performance of a BF. In this paper injection of alternative reducing agents via lances in the tubers of blast furnaces is discussed to reduce the consumption of metallurgical coke. Besides liquid hydrocarbons and pulverized coal the injection of recycled waste plastics is possible, offering the opportunity to chemically reuse waste material and also utilize the energy contained in such remnants.

scholarly journals A Generalization Performance Study Using Deep Learning Networks in Embedded Systems

Sensors ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 1031
Author(s):  
Joseba Gorospe ◽  
Rubén Mulero ◽  
Olatz Arbelaitz ◽  
Javier Muguerza ◽  
Miguel Ángel Antón
Keyword(s):  
Deep Learning ◽  
Embedded Systems ◽  
Embedded System ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Learning Networks ◽  
Performance Study ◽  
Learning Techniques ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Learning Architectures

Deep learning techniques are being increasingly used in the scientific community as a consequence of the high computational capacity of current systems and the increase in the amount of data available as a result of the digitalisation of society in general and the industrial world in particular. In addition, the immersion of the field of edge computing, which focuses on integrating artificial intelligence as close as possible to the client, makes it possible to implement systems that act in real time without the need to transfer all of the data to centralised servers. The combination of these two concepts can lead to systems with the capacity to make correct decisions and act based on them immediately and in situ. Despite this, the low capacity of embedded systems greatly hinders this integration, so the possibility of being able to integrate them into a wide range of micro-controllers can be a great advantage. This paper contributes with the generation of an environment based on Mbed OS and TensorFlow Lite to be embedded in any general purpose embedded system, allowing the introduction of deep learning architectures. The experiments herein prove that the proposed system is competitive if compared to other commercial systems.

scholarly journals Scaling-up production of plant endophytes in bioreactors: concepts, challenges and perspectives

2021 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Seedhabadee Ganeshan ◽  
Seon Hwa Kim ◽  
Vladimir Vujanovic
Keyword(s):  
Crop Production ◽  
Process Development ◽  
Hazard Analysis ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Process Technology ◽  
Lack Of Information ◽  
Agriculture Industry ◽  
Start Up ◽  
Plant Growth Promoting ◽  
Agriculture And Food

AbstractThe benefit of microorganisms to humans, animals, insects and plants is increasingly recognized, with intensified microbial endophytes research indicative of this realization. In the agriculture industry, the benefits are tremendous to move towards sustainable crop production and minimize or circumvent the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. The research leading to the identification of potential plant endophytes is long and arduous and for many researchers the challenge is ultimately in scale-up production. While many of the larger agriculture and food industries have their own scale-up and manufacturing facilities, for many in academia and start-up companies the next steps towards production have been a stumbling block due to lack of information and understanding of the processes involved in scale-up fermentation. This review provides an overview of the fermentation process from shake flask cultures to scale-up and the manufacturing steps involved such as process development optimization (PDO), process hazard analysis (PHA), pre-, in- and post-production (PIP) challenges and finally the preparation of a technology transfer package (TTP) to transition the PDO to manufacturing. The focus is on submerged liquid fermentation (SLF) and plant endophytes production by providing original examples of fungal and bacterial endophytes, plant growth promoting Penicillium sp. and Streptomyces sp. bioinoculants, respectively. We also discuss the concepts, challenges and future perspectives of the scale-up microbial endophyte process technology based on the industrial and biosafety research platform for advancing a massive production of next-generation biologicals in bioreactors.

scholarly journals Scaling Up Delivery of Biofortified Staple Food Crops Globally: Paths to Nourishing Millions

2021 ◽  
pp. 037957212098250
Author(s):  
Jennifer K. Foley ◽  
Kristina D. Michaux ◽  
Bho Mudyahoto ◽  
Laira Kyazike ◽  
Binu Cherian ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Pearl Millet ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Scale Up ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
Raw Material ◽  
Micronutrient Deficiencies ◽  
Seed Systems ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Context Specific ◽  
Public And Private Sector

Background: Micronutrient deficiencies affect over one quarter of the world’s population. Biofortification is an evidence-based nutrition strategy that addresses some of the most common and preventable global micronutrient gaps and can help improve the health of millions of people. Since 2013, HarvestPlus and a consortium of collaborators have made impressive progress in the enrichment of staple crops with essential micronutrients through conventional plant breeding. Objective: To review and highlight lessons learned from multiple large-scale delivery strategies used by HarvestPlus to scale up biofortification across different country and crop contexts. Results: India has strong public and private sector pearl millet breeding programs and a robust commercial seed sector. To scale-up pearl millet, HarvestPlus established partnerships with public and private seed companies, which facilitated the rapid commercialization of products and engagement of farmers in delivery activities. In Nigeria, HarvestPlus stimulated the initial acceptance and popularization of vitamin A cassava using a host of creative approaches, including “crowding in” delivery partners, innovative promotional programs, and development of intermediate raw material for industry and novel food products. In Uganda, orange sweet potato (OSP) is a traditional subsistence crop. Due to this, and the lack of formal seed systems and markets, HarvestPlus established a network of partnerships with community-based nongovernmental organizations and vine multipliers to popularize and scale-up delivery of OSP. Conclusions: Impact of biofortification ultimately depends on the development of sustainable markets for biofortified seeds and products. Results illustrate the need for context-specific, innovative solutions to promote widespread adoption.

scholarly journals Risk and the Republican National Convention: Application of the Novel COVID-19 Operational Risk Assessment

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
David Callaway ◽  
Jeff Runge ◽  
Lucia Mullen ◽  
Lisa Rentz ◽  
Kevin Staley ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Risk Assessment ◽  
Health Care ◽  
Care Delivery ◽  
The United States ◽  
Lessons Learned ◽  
World Health ◽  
Local Health ◽  
Mass Gathering ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
National Convention

Abstract The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the World Health Organization broadly categorize mass gathering events as high risk for amplification of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) spread in a community due to the nature of respiratory diseases and the transmission dynamics. However, various measures and modifications can be put in place to limit or reduce the risk of further spread of COVID-19 for the mass gathering. During this pandemic, the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security produced a risk assessment and mitigation tool for decision-makers to assess SARS-CoV-2 transmission risks that may arise as organizations and businesses hold mass gatherings or increase business operations: The JHU Operational Toolkit for Businesses Considering Reopening or Expanding Operations in COVID-19 (Toolkit). This article describes the deployment of a data-informed, risk-reduction strategy that protects local communities, preserves local health-care capacity, and supports democratic processes through the safe execution of the Republican National Convention in Charlotte, North Carolina. The successful use of the Toolkit and the lessons learned from this experience are applicable in a wide range of public health settings, including school reopening, expansion of public services, and even resumption of health-care delivery.

scholarly journals An information theoretic approach to link prediction in multiplex networks

2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Seyed Hossein Jafari ◽  
Amir Mahdi Abdolhosseini-Qomi ◽  
Masoud Asadpour ◽  
Maseud Rahgozar ◽  
Naser Yazdani
Keyword(s):  
Real World ◽  
Link Prediction ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Similarity Measures ◽  
Prediction Method ◽  
General Purpose ◽  
Fast Method ◽  
Theoretic Approach ◽  
Multiplex Networks ◽  
Wide Range

AbstractThe entities of real-world networks are connected via different types of connections (i.e., layers). The task of link prediction in multiplex networks is about finding missing connections based on both intra-layer and inter-layer correlations. Our observations confirm that in a wide range of real-world multiplex networks, from social to biological and technological, a positive correlation exists between connection probability in one layer and similarity in other layers. Accordingly, a similarity-based automatic general-purpose multiplex link prediction method—SimBins—is devised that quantifies the amount of connection uncertainty based on observed inter-layer correlations in a multiplex network. Moreover, SimBins enhances the prediction quality in the target layer by incorporating the effect of link overlap across layers. Applying SimBins to various datasets from diverse domains, our findings indicate that SimBins outperforms the compared methods (both baseline and state-of-the-art methods) in most instances when predicting links. Furthermore, it is discussed that SimBins imposes minor computational overhead to the base similarity measures making it a potentially fast method, suitable for large-scale multiplex networks.

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