Mainstream Research Articles

Diagnosis of early creep degradation in 12Cr1MoVG steel based on a hybrid magnetic NDE approach

Accurate identification of microstructural degradation that occurs prior to crack coalescence and growth is crucial for continuous online monitoring of creep damage in main stream pipelines. The magnetic non-destructive testing technique is well-established for quantitative property measurement of creep degradation in steels. During the interrupted creep of 12Cr1MoVG steel at 580 ℃ and 110 MPa, the magnetic properties of crept specimens were evaluated using a combination of magnetic hysteresis loop and Barkhausen noise techniques, the microstructural evolution was also examined by means of scanning electron microscopy combined with EBSD method. The microscopic coercive force and Barkhausen noise characteristic values were chosen as the main parameters of diagnosis, as the most sensitive to the microstructural evolution such as dislocations, precipitates and voids, reflects the changes in material condition indicative of early degradation. Besides, these magnetic signatures even can identify the locations that potentially susceptible to future creep damage in the material, which were validated by microhardness measurement, grain misorientation and dislocation density distributions. It suggested that this work could be used as the technical basis for proactive management of material early degradation in the steam pipelines.

Microbiology of post-fermentation leachate

Using post-fermentation leachate as fertilizer is a good alternative and solution to the problem of waste at wastewater treatment plants and contains the principles of sustainable development. Leachate from anaerobic treatment of sewage sludge contains valuable elements such as phosphorus, nitrogen and potassium, which can improve soil properties. The production of liquid fertilizer minimizes the negative impact of leachate on the main biological stream in the WWTP and improves the energy efficiency of the entire wastewater treatment system. This transfers into the operating costs of the facility. When thinking about the agricultural use of digestion leachate and its introduction into the environment, a very important issue is its microbiological contamination. The purpose of the conducted research was to determine the microbiological quality of digestion leachates from municipal wastewater treatment plants and to determine the parameters of their hygienization. The number of bacteria in raw leachate is indicative of a sanitary risk in the case they are used in agriculture as fertiliser. Heating the leachate at 60°C for 15 minutes produces an effect comparable to that achieved by heating the leachate to 70°C. The sonication process itself did not affect the better temperature effect. Heating the leachate for 20 minutes after prior sonication for 20 minutes does not result in the complete elimination of microflora.

Rozwiązanie problemu tworzenia się zatorów w rurociągach podczas transportu gazu poprzez proces automatycznego strumieniowania

The article presents the application of autoejection process to ensure efficient operation of pipeline systems and gas separation installations when it is impossible to remove and utilize the condensate from the pipelines. Thus, in the suggested ejector, a single common stream is separated into two streams, i.e., an active and a passive stream, as opposed to two separate independent streams in existing ejection devices. As a result, we refer to such an ejection process as autoejection, or a self-ejection process. Such a procedure is run in the pipeline with the goal of blowing and dusting the liquid phase through the central high-velocity nozzle in circumstances of mass blocking and coating rather than expelling the liquid from the pipes. On the cross-sectional area of the belts, the velocity profiles of flows in laminar and turbulent regimes are known to differ greatly from one another. The adhesion forces acting from the tube's central axis outwards, towards its walls cause the flow rate to decrease. There is a cross-sectional interaction of flows in this mode, according to experimental studies of turbulent flows. As a result, compared to the laminar domain, the flow velocities in this regime are more equally distributed across the cross-section of the flow, and their values are roughly equal to the flow's average value. In this case, based on the dependences of the flow ∆p = f(W), it is known from the calculations and the table that at such velocity limits of the flows, the “braking” pressure (p0) of the liquid coating on the pipe walls corresponds to the maximum velocity of the central gas flow. The autoejection process can occur due to the difference between the static pressures. Unsaturated absorbent coatings can be blasted off the tube absorber's walls using this technique and blended back into the main gas stream. Gas-liquid autoejectors installed along the pipe absorber's length make it possible to use this method. The purpose and principles of autoejectors’ operation are considered and a perspective of their application in tube absorbers is noted.

Study on the up-downstream water level correlation and the extreme water levels under flood-tide encounters of the Feiyun River main stream

Study on the up-downstream water level correlation and the extreme water levels under flood-tide encounters of the Feiyun River main stream

渭河干流甘肃段河岸线空间变化数据集（2008、2015、2022年）

As the largest tributary of the Yellow River, the Weihe River has an important influence on the Yellow River in terms of both its flow and sediment load. Carrying out spatial and temporal evolution monitoring of the river shorelines is an important basis for grasping the hydrological changes of the river in the basin. In this study, we used the high-frequency and resource satellite image data of the Gansu section of the Weihe River in 2008, 2015 and 2022 as the base map, and extracted the river shorelines of the Gansu section of the Weihe River through the processing of image ortho-correction, alignment, fusion, mosaicing and cropping; combining with the image characteristics of the image, we adopted the method of interactive deciphering, including the Weihe River management range line, the Weihe River waterfront boundary line, and the Weihe River outer edge boundary line. Additionally, high-precision UAV aerial image data were utilized, integrating typical areas and important markers on the image base map data to ensure the reliability of river shoreline extraction. This dataset can provide data support for studying the hydrological dynamic monitoring and driving mechanisms of the Weihe River main stream. Furthermore, it can serve as basis for making informed decisions regarding the protection of river and lake shorelines and the ecological management of the river.

Adopting a hot film to measure thickness of an ice layer under sweeping wind

Ice can easily form on low-temperature surfaces. To prevent damage caused by undesirable ice, the presence of ice on a surface together with the ice thickness must be determined. This investigation proposed to measure the thickness of an ice layer under sweeping wind using a hot film and two thermocouples. On the basis of the steady temperature gradient in the ice layer and the solved ice-layer surface temperature from the main stream, the ice layer thickness was obtained. The model required the heat flux through the ice layer and the measured steady temperature rise at the ice surface adjacent to the heater. The ice thickness determined by the proposed method was compared with that measured with a microcalliper. In addition, CFD was used to generate temperature data to evaluate the proposed method for the ice layer blown by high-speed winds. The results demonstrated that the proposed method could accurately measure the thickness of the ice layer under wind blowing at 5–300 m/s. The relative discrepancy in the inferred ice thickness with the microcalliper-measured thickness was <10%, and the accuracy of the method increased with the wind speed.

A review of the mechanisms of action and clinical consequences of interactions between antidiabetic medications and botanicals

Diabetes is a complex condition with a variety of causes and patho-physiologies. The current single target approach has not provided ideal clinical outcomes for the treatment of the disease and its complications. Herbal medicine has been used for the management of various diseases such as diabetes over centuries. Many diabetic patients are known to use herbal medicines with antidiabetic properties in addition to their main stream treatments, which may present both a benefit as well as potential risk to effective management of their disease. In this review, we evaluate the clinical and experimental literature on herb–drug interactions in the treatment of diabetes. Pharmacokinetic and pharmaco-dynamic interactions between drugs and herbs are discussed, and some commonly used herbs, which can interact with antidiabetic drugs summarized. Herb–drug interactions can be a double-edgeds word presenting both risks (adverse drug events) and benefits (through enhancement). There is a general lack of data on herb–drug interactions. As such, more rigorous scientific research is urgently needed to guide clinical practice as well as to safeguard the wellbeing of diabetes patients.

Streamer propagation characteristics of nanosecond pulsed discharge plasma on fluidized particles surface: experimental investigation and numerical simulation

Plasma fluidized-bed contributes to strengthening the interaction between active species in plasma and fluidized powder particles, resulting in higher active species utilization efficiency and superior powders processing/modification performance. However, the plasma streamer dynamics on the fluidized powder particles are still unclear due to the intricacy of plasma fluidized-bed. In this work, the time-resolved evolution behavior of plasma streamers on fluidized powder particles surfaces has been explored in plasma fluidized-bed system based on a simplified pin-cylinder configuration. The results reveal that the entire streamer propagation process includes volume discharge and surface discharge. The maximum electron density generated by surface discharge is one order of magnitude higher than that produced by volume discharge, indicating that surface discharge plays a dominant role in powder particles modification. The presence of fluidized particle will cause streamer branching, and the main streamer splits into two independent sub-streamers for propagation in a ‘parabola-like’ shape. Compared with large-size fluidized particles (1000 µm), streamer wraps a larger area on micron-size fluidized particles (200 µm), with a 78% increase in the coverage area, which is favorable to the modification of powder particles. Furthermore, the evolution of active species on fluidized particle surface is analyzed. The active species (N, O, O2 −) are mainly distributed around the north pole, and N2 + is mainly distributed between 25° and 50° of the particles. With the decrease of fluidized particle size, the polarization effect between particles is significantly enhanced, and the maxima of the number densities of active species increase. These findings help to get a better understanding of the interaction between plasma and fluidized particles in fluidized systems.

DS-AL: A Dual-Stream Analytic Learning for Exemplar-Free Class-Incremental Learning

Class-incremental learning (CIL) under an exemplar-free constraint has presented a significant challenge. Existing methods adhering to this constraint are prone to catastrophic forgetting, far more so than replay-based techniques that retain access to past samples. In this paper, to solve the exemplar-free CIL problem, we propose a Dual-Stream Analytic Learning (DS-AL) approach. The DS-AL contains a main stream offering an analytical (i.e., closed-form) linear solution, and a compensation stream improving the inherent under-fitting limitation due to adopting linear mapping. The main stream redefines the CIL problem into a Concatenated Recursive Least Squares (C-RLS) task, allowing an equivalence between the CIL and its joint-learning counterpart. The compensation stream is governed by a Dual-Activation Compensation (DAC) module. This module re-activates the embedding with a different activation function from the main stream one, and seeks fitting compensation by projecting the embedding to the null space of the main stream's linear mapping. Empirical results demonstrate that the DS-AL, despite being an exemplar-free technique, delivers performance comparable with or better than that of replay-based methods across various datasets, including CIFAR-100, ImageNet-100 and ImageNet-Full. Additionally, the C-RLS' equivalent property allows the DS-AL to execute CIL in a phase-invariant manner. This is evidenced by a never-before-seen 500-phase CIL ImageNet task, which performs on a level identical to a 5-phase one. Our codes are available at https://github.com/ZHUANGHP/Analytic-continual-learning.

Macrobenthic Community Structure and Water Quality Evaluation in Ulungu River Basin (Northwest China)

In this study, the composition and structure of the macrobenthic community in the Ulungu River Basin was investigated and the water quality status of the basin was evaluated. In May and August 2022, and October 2023, the macrobenthic and water environmental factors at 11 sample sites in the basin were investigated, and the water quality of the basin was evaluated by the Shannon–Wiener index, FBI, and BMWP index. A total of 6101 macrobenthic organisms were collected; these organisms belonged to 3 phyla, 7 classes, 14 orders, 57 families, and 117 genera. Arthropod species accounted for the largest number of species (87.9%). A total of nine dominant species were found: Micronecta sp., Eukiefferiella sp., Baetis sp., Polypedilum sp., Saetheria sp., Ephemerella sp., Limnodrilus sp., Ephemera sp., and Hydropsyche sp. At the temporal level, the average density and biomass of macrobenthos were in the order of August &gt; October &gt; May; at the spatial level, the average density was greater in the tributaries than in the main stream, and the average biomass was greater in the main stream than in the tributaries. The mean values of the Shannon—Wiener index and Margalef richness index were as follows: August &gt; October &gt; May at the temporal level; the mean values of the Pielou evenness index were as follows: May &gt; October &gt; August at the temporal level. At the spatial level, the overall mean value of each diversity index indicated that the tributaries had larger diversity indices than the main stream. The water quality evaluation results revealed that the overall water quality level of the Ulungu River Basin ranges from light pollution to poor quality. Human interference activities greatly impact the water quality of the basin. To restore the ecology of the basin, it is necessary to strengthen the management and control of pollution sources.

The Relationship between Cohabitation and the Reluctance to Have Children

The trend of unmarried couples choosing to share a home has become more main stream in recent years. In this study, researchers compare the attitudes of cohabiting and newlywed couples toward the decision to have a family. The purpose of this study is to examine the relationship between cohabitation and reluctance to have children by comparing the attitudes of cohabiting couples and newlyweds. The purpose of this study is to examine the variables that impact family planning choices in contemporary partnerships. There were 40 participants in this quantitative study, including 20 cohabiting couples and 20 newlywed couples from Israel. Participants filled out a separate questionnaire designed to probe their feelings about having children and family planning. T-tests and other statistical analyses were used to evaluate differences in responses between the two groups. The average score for newlyweds was 4.3, while the average score for cohabiting couples was 2.8 on a Likert scale measuring agreement with the value of having children within families. Statistical tests verified the significant gaps in perspectives on family planning between the two groups. The research shows that cohabiting couples and newlyweds have quite different perspectives on motherhood. Despite certain caveats, the results seem to indicate that cohabiting couples are less likely to want to have a family than married ones. This study adds important context to the conversation about how relationships and social norms are changing over time, and it highlights the need to do future research with more significant and varied populations.

Fintech: A Stepping Stone Towards Financial Inclusion

Digital transformation underscored as the fourth industrial revolution has led to the emergence of various sophisticated technology-enabled financial services in various fields. One such major innovation called Fintech took place in the field of commerce and management as well. Fintech as the term implies is the combination of two terms Finance and Technology which simply means application of technology in the field of finance. Fintech refers to all the digital technologies that have the potential to transform the provision of financial services spurring the development of new or modify the existing business models, applications, processes, and products. Global adoption of FinTech is rapidly increasing due to its disruptive nature and is largely embraced by the various participants in the financial sector who are under served by traditional financial service providers. There exists a gap in the literature and visualization research on impact and future pathway of FinTech innovations in payments and financial services and role of financial regulations. This study aims to enrich the understanding of FinTech innovations in payments and financing and investigate the correlation and significance of regulatory framework in maintaining a fair ecosystem where the under served sections of the economy are included in the main stream economy. For this purpose, data were collected by using a well-designed Personal Interview Schedule and was circulated to 100 respondents under convenient sampling technique. The collected data were then analyzed with the help of statistical tools like Simple Percentage Analysis, Ranking method and Mean Percentage Analysis. The results of this study imply that the under served sections of the economy still remains the same and also provide a holistic insight to innovations in FinTech

Revitalizing green progress: Assessing corporate environmental performance in the wake of Yangtze River Major Conservation initiatives

The Yangtze River Major Conservation (YRMC) Action has been strategically crafted to catalyze industrial evolution within the Yangtze River basin, aligning with China's goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2060, particularly from the corporate perspective. Despite its significance, the potential impact of this initiative on corporate environmental performance (CEP) remains understudied. To address this gap, we utilize panel data from Chinese firms listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen A-shares (2012–2020) and employ the difference-in-differences (DID) method to investigate the causal relationship between the YRMC Action and the CEP. The main findings are threefold: (i) Firms located within a 100 km radius of the Yangtze River's main stream have exhibited an average increase of 0.1497 units in CEP due to the implementation of the YRMC Action, which are consistently validated across robustness tests; (ii) Mechanisms driving this enhancement include incentivizing firms to undertake green technological R&D programs, securing governmental green R&D subsidies, and credit incentives; and (iii) Heterogeneity analyses show that firms closer to the main stream of the Yangtze River, particularly those upstream and led by senior executives with awareness of green initiatives, have contributed to more pronounced improvements in CEP. This paper highlights policy implications for optimizing the incentive effects of the YRMC Action and strengthening the environmental regulatory governance to ensure enduring enhancements in CEP.

Memes, humor, and the far right’s strategic mainstreaming

ABSTRACT The far right is increasingly relying on visual and less extreme online communication, for instance by using memes, to strategically mainstream their ideology. The use of humor in particular renders their communication more relatable to a mainstream audience. However, little is known about the actual impacts of the different content characteristics they employ to become more appealing, in particular on less moderated platforms that function as safe online spaces for extremist ideology and contents. To fill this gap, we conducted a manual quantitative content analysis of 1,200 memes distributed within German-language far-right Telegram channels in 2020 and 2021, concentrating on humor and several content-related factors to analyze their impact on meme reach. The results demonstrate that memes with extreme far-right narratives and memes with humor received fewer views than others, but that memes with both far-right narratives and humor had a significantly increased reach. The findings highlight the mainstreaming potential of humor, particularly when used to mask extreme content that would otherwise be less appealing.

Pollution Characteristics and Ecological Risk Assessment of Microplastics in the Yangtze River Basin

The Yangtze River, the largest river in China, has not been comprehensively studied for its basin's microplastic pollution status. Therefore, a comprehensive investigation and assessment system of microplastics was developed at the river basin scale to characterize the spatial distribution and composition of microplastics in the Yangtze River Basin in order to analyze their influencing factors and assess their ecological risks. The results showed that the microplastic abundance in the study area ranged from 21 to 44 080 n·m-3, with an average abundance of 4 483 n·m-3. The spatial distribution of microplastic abundance was higher in the tributaries than in the main streams (except the Ganjiang Basin), with the Chengdu of the Minjiang Basin being the tributary area with the highest abundance of microplastics detected. The size of microplastics in the river basin was concentrated in the 0-1 mm range; the shapes were mainly fiber and fragment; and the colors were mainly colored and transparent. Further, introducing the diversity index of microplastics, it was found that both the Simpson index and the Shannon-Wiener index could quantify the diversity of microplastic characteristic composition in the river basin, but there were certain differences in the changing trends between the two. Regression analysis showed that anthropogenic activities were significantly and positively correlated with microplastic abundance (P<0.05), and among the eight anthropogenic activity factors, civilian vehicle ownership and tourism income were the most strongly correlated with microplastic abundance, indicating that transportation and tourism were the main factors influencing microplastic distribution. From the perspective of the potential ecological risk index of microplastics, microplastics in the Yangtze River Basin posed a certain ecological risk, with 68.97% of the area falling within risk zones III and IV, with the ecological risk of microplastics in Taihu Lake warranting more widespread attention.

Trends and patterns in ESG research: A bibliometric odyssey and research agenda

AbstractThe paper provides a detailed analysis of the ESG literature with the aim of bringing clarity to this area of research and proposing a research agenda. An overview of the development of the literature on ESG pillars is offered through a review of 903 peer‐reviewed articles. The paper identifies four thematic clusters: impacts of ESG disclosure and practices, sustainability, accounting, and responsible investments. The main research streams and sub‐streams for each cluster are discussed, highlighting the most frequent theoretical perspectives and methodologies. Furthermore, the evolution of ESG research across time is delineated. The paper also identifies future research directions within each cluster to advance knowledge, and proposes an integrative framework based on focal themes and their reciprocal connections.

Activist entrepreneurship for a sustainable future: an integrative framework

With the growth of activism in our societies, research has begun to explore the possible links between activism and entrepreneurship. Three main streams of research - social entrepreneurship, institutional entrepreneurship, and sustainable entrepreneurship - have already approached the links between activism and entrepreneurship. Reinterpreting an emblematic case from each research stream through an activist lens allows us to identify previously untheorized elements. The result is an integrative framework for the phenomenon of activist entrepreneurship organized around three main components: 1) cause advocacy; 2) community generation; 3) boundless action. The framework provides a common reading grid for all phenomena combining activism and entrepreneurship.

Varna or Karma: Reidentifying Disability in Main Stream in the Novels of Amish Tripathi through the Lens of Michel Foucault

Varna or Karma: Reidentifying Disability in Main Stream in the Novels of Amish Tripathi through the Lens of Michel Foucault

Landslide and ravine distributions related to ground conditions in elevated marine deposit in Mid-Norway

The Trondheim and Gauldal areas in Mid-Norway are characterized by thick marine deposits from the ice age and deglaciation period. The following glacio-isostatic rebound has led to river incisions in the valleys and extensive landsliding and ravine erosion. This study is based on data from an upgraded Quaternary geological map of this region for the areas below the highest sea level after the last ice age, with a focus on landslide scars and ravines. The study has a multidisciplinary approach, which is important in order to get a good regional geological understanding of the ground conditions and the landscape development. This means that geological, geomorphological, geotechnical, geophysical and hydrogeological data are used. The study area is divided into six parts, based on natural topographical divisions and the distribution of landslide scars and ravines. Factors influencing the development of sensitive clay and the triggering of landslides are described for each area; these include sediment distribution, thicknesses and stratigraphy, bedrock topography, the degree of leaching of clay, groundwater conditions, the number, size and shape of landslides, and the distribution of rivers, streams and ravines. The study shows that the size, behaviour and erosional potential of the main river or stream influence the landscape development to a high degree. The erosional basis, stratigraphy and presence of bedrock are essential for leaching and the development of quick clay.

Evidence for a Constant Slip Rate Over the Last ∼40 ka Along the Mt. Morrone Fault System in Central Apennines

AbstractLocated in the easternmost portion of the Central Apennines, the Mt. Morrone normal fault system is one of the highest seismic hazards in Italy. Previous geological and geomorphological observations revealed the presence of a ∼22 km‐long NW‐SE right‐lateral en echelon fault system made of two parallel faults affecting Quaternary deposits. Our analysis focused on the westernmost fault, which bounds the Sulmona Basin. Cumulative offsets were identified and quantified using high‐resolution Digital Elevation Models derived from LiDAR, Satellite Pleiades images, and drone acquisition at the three sites. Morphological markers displaced from a few to tens of meters were dated using 36Cl exposure dating. The results would be suggesting a fault slip rate of 0.2–0.4 mm/a. The deformed markers that dated at 36–44 ka consist of alluvial terraces emplaced by the main streams flowing down from Mt. Morrone to the Sulmona Basin, subsequently incised, and preserved when the fluvial base level dropped because of the former Sulmona lake fluctuations. The yielded ages for these markers fit well with the last major aggradational event associated with the 35–40 ka Heinrich event described and dated to other fluvial basins in the Apennines. Furthermore, the estimated rate agrees with the values obtained in previous studies over shorter and longer periods (105−6 years) and within similar uncertainties. This might then suggest that the period recovered by this study encompasses the entire seismic cycle.