Thermodynamic Rarity Assessment of Mobile Phone PCBs: A Physical Criticality Indicator in Times of Shortage

Rising prices in energy, raw materials, and shortages of critical raw materials (CRMs) for renewable energies or electric vehicles are jeopardizing the transition to a low-carbon economy. Therefore, managing scarce resources must be a priority for governments. To that end, appropriate indicators that can identify the criticality of raw materials and products is key. Thermodynamic rarity (TR) is an exergy-based indicator that measures the scarcity of elements in the earth’s crust and the energy intensity to extract and refine them. This paper uses TR to study 70 Mobile Phone (MP) Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) samples. Results show that an average MP PCB has a TR of 88 MJ per unit, indicating their intensive use of valuable materials. Every year the embedded TR increases by 36,250 GWh worldwide -similar to the electricity consumed by Denmark in 2019- due to annual production of MP. Pd, Ta and Au embedded in MP PCBs worldwide between 2007 and 2021 contribute to 90% of the overall TR, which account for 75, 600 and 250 tones, respectively, and increasing by 11% annually. This, coupled with the short lifespan of MP, makes PCBs an important potential source of secondary resources.

Neuroecology of Alcohol Preference in Drosophila

In this review, we highlight sources of alcohols in nature, as well as the behavioral and ecological roles that these fermentation cues play in the short lifespan of Drosophila melanogaster. With a focus on neuroethology, we describe the olfactory detection of alcohol as well as ensuing neural signaling within the brain of the fly. We proceed to explain the plethora of behaviors related to alcohol, including attraction, feeding, and oviposition, as well as general effects on aggression and courtship. All of these behaviors are shaped by physiological state and social contexts. In a comparative perspective, we also discuss inter- and intraspecies differences related to alcohol tolerance and metabolism. Lastly, we provide corollaries with other dipteran and coleopteran insect species that also have olfactory systems attuned to ethanol detection and describe ecological and evolutionary directions for further studies of the natural history of alcohol and the fly.

Parents' Determinants Buying Intent on Environmentally Friendly Children's Clothing

Fast-fashion products encourage parents to spend more on their children’s necessities. As a result, children’s clothing consumption is increasingly higher in a family due to child growth and change of needs. Due to the short lifespan of children’s clothes, the waste of clothing is increasing rapidly. This research aims to study the opinion of parents and the acceptance of children’s environmental-friendly clothing. The research examined parents’ buying patterns such as shopping frequency, disposal practices and the purchase of child clothing experience. This work has embraced the idea of eco-fashion design to examine the clothing needs of children and the knowledge of the parents. Hence, a quantitative analysis was applied to research among parents in January 2020 in Malaysia. This research contributes to academic results about parents’ decision-making on the children clothing subject. The findings showed that parents were aware of the idea of sustainable apparel; the cost, quality, design, and health issues were the most significant factors that influenced consumer’s decisions to purchase children’s clothing. Sustainable children’s clothing was preferred by parents as it had multiple benefits which impacted children’s health, preserves the environment as well as cost and time effective. For future research, further exploration relating to disposal and sustainable clothing design for children is suggested.

The Common Marmoset: A Highly Translatable Small Nonhuman Primate Model of Aging

The common marmoset (Callithrix jacchus) has been used in biomedical research for many years, but within the last decade its popularity has increased dramatically prompted to a large degree by their realized utility for neuroscience and aging research. Many factors make the marmoset an attractive model system including their genetic and physiological similarity to humans, relatively short lifespan (average of ~13 years, maximum of ~20 years), high fertility (highest of any primate, routine production of 2-3 offspring every 5-6 months), rapid development (reproductively competent by ~1.5 years of age, aged by 7-8 years of age), small size (~400 grams), human-like social structure consisting of cooperative breeding with shared parenting responsibilities, and lack of zoonotic diseases of concern to humans. Marmosets share ~93% sequence identity with the human genome and they develop similar age-related conditions as humans. Marmosets may strike the perfect balance between similarity to humans and abbreviated aging course.

Ni as the introductory particle for expressions of negation in three dialectal variants of Spanish

When looking at expressions of negation/rejection in Spanish, the conjunction ni is one of the most prolific words. However, the extent of locutions employing ni has not been widely analyzed. For this reason, we conducted a comparative descriptive examination of discourse markers of rejection and refusal for three different dialectal variants of Spanish: those of Spain, Colombia and Mexico. The participants completed a survey to evaluate their familiarity with some of these pragmatic expressions and to provide new ones. Results show that speakers of these dialectal variants all use the most common markers that start with ni, but also other phrases not recorded in many of the available sources. This paper aims to broaden the horizon of work on phraseological units of negation, which are often difficult to gather and study in depth because of their dialectal variability, colloquial use, and, in some cases, short lifespan.

Upcycling Compact Discs for Bioelectronic Applications

Electronic waste (e-waste) is a global issue brought about by the short lifespan of electronics. Viable methods to relieve the inundated disposal system by repurposing the enormous amount of e-waste remain elusive. Inspired by the need for sustainable solutions, this study resulted in a multifaceted approach to upcycling compact discs (CDs). The once-ubiquitous plates can be transformed into stretchable and flexible biosensors. Our experiments and advanced prototypes show that effective, innovative biosensors can be developed at a low-cost. An affordable craft-based mechanical cutter allows pre-determined patterns to be scored on the recycled metal, an essential first step for producing stretchable, wearable electronics. The active metal harvested from the CDs was inert, cytocompatible, and capable of vital biopotential measurements. Additional studies examined the material’s resistive emittance, temperature sensing, real-time metabolite monitoring performance, and moisture-triggered transience. This sustainable approach for upcycling e-waste provides an advantageous research-based waste stream that does not require cutting-edge microfabrication facilities, expensive materials, and high-caliber engineering skills.

165 Rethinking Methane - Livestock’s Path to Climate Neutrality

Animal agriculture is often shouldered with a large part of the blame when it comes to climate change, but that’s because we haven’t been looking at all greenhouse gases correctly. While methane is a potent climate pollutant that we can and need to reduce, it warms our atmosphere differently than other gases because of its short lifespan. By rethinking methane, we can see that animal agriculture can be on the path to climate neutrality with scalable solutions and give the global community tools to fight global climate change.

Transcriptome Analysis Reveals the Senescence Process Controlling the Flower Opening and Closure Rhythm in the Waterlilies (Nymphaea L.)

Most waterlily flowers open at dawn and close after noon usually for three to four days, and thereafter wilt. The short lifespan of flowers restricts the development of the flower postharvest industry. The termination of flower movements is a key event during flower aging process. However, it is still unclear when the senescence process initiates and how it terminates the movement rhythm. In this study, we observed that the opening diameter of flowers was the smallest on the fourth (last) flowering day. Subsequent transcriptome profiles generated from petals at different flowering stages showed that the multiple signaling pathways were activated at the last closure stage (Time 3, T3) of the flowers, including Ca2+, reactive oxygen species and far red light signaling pathways, as well as auxin, ethylene and jasmonic acid signaling pathways. Moreover, In terms of cell metabolism regulation, the genes related to hydrolase (protease, phospholipase, nuclease) were upregulated at T3 stage, indicating that petals entered the senescence stage at that time; and the genes related to water transport and cell wall modification were also differentially regulated at T3 stage, which would affect the ability of cell expand and contract, and eventually lead to petal not open after the fourth day. Collectively, our data provided a new insight into the termination of flower opening in the waterlilies, and a global understanding of the senescence process of those opening-closure rhythm flowers.

On the effect of inheritance of microbes in commensal microbiomes

Background. Our current view of nature depicts a world where macroorganisms dwell in a landscape full of microbes. Some of these microbes not only transit but establish themselves in or on hosts. Although hosts might be occupied by microbes for most of their lives, a microbe-free stage during their prenatal development seems to be the rule for many hosts. The questions of who the first colonizers of a newborn host are and to what extent these are obtained from the parents follow naturally. Results. We have developed a mathematical model to study the effect of the transfer of microbes from parents to offspring. Even without selection, we observe that microbial inheritance is particularly effective in modifying the microbiome of hosts with a short lifespan or limited colonization from the environment, for example by favouring the acquisition of rare microbes. Conclusion. By modelling the inheritance of commensal microbes to newborns, our results suggest that, in an eco-evolutionary context, the impact of microbial inheritance is of particular importance for some specific life histories.