Real Hot Spot Research Articles

How do meteorological conditions impact the effectiveness of various traffic measures on NOx concentrations in a real hot-spot?

Recently, air quality has become a major concern for policy makers around the world, which has led to the implementation of mitigation measures. In particular, in urban areas most measures affect the road transport sector, as this is one of the main contributors to air pollution in those areas. Recent studies have pointed out the need to determine the importance of external factors such as the meteorological conditions on the net effect on air quality of mitigation strategies. Due to the strong spatial variability of urban air pollution, high spatial resolution modelling is necessary. In this work, the impacts on emissions and nitrogen oxides (NOx) concentrations of several mitigation strategies on a real air pollution hot spot in southern Madrid (Spain) are simulated at microscale under different meteorological conditions. The results show that the meteorological conditions affect local NOx concentrations, and its net changes can be comparable to those due to emission reductions. In particular, meteorological conditions in 2019 induced higher NOx concentrations than in 2016, despite the local emissions were reduced by 50 % from 2016 to 2019. On the other hand, the impact of the implementation of a Low Emissions Zone (LEZ) on NOx concentrations is small and consistent with values found in other LEZs around Europe. However, this impact varies up to 70 % depending on the meteorological conditions. The impacts of a mitigation strategy are largely influenced by the meteorological conditions, and therefore the achievement of the target reduction of concentrations pursued by these measures will depend on the meteorological conditions.

Enrichment of titin-truncating variants in exon 327 in dilated cardiomyopathy and its relevance to reduced nonsense-mediated mRNA decay efficiency.

Titin truncating variants (TTNtvs) are the most common genetic cause of dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM). Among four regions of titin, A-band enrichment of DCM-causing TTNtvs is widely accepted but the underlying mechanism is still unknown. Meanwhile, few reports have identified exon 327 as a highly mutated A-band exon but the degree of exon 327 enrichment has not been quantitatively investigated. To find the real hotspot of DCM-causing TTNtvs, we aimed to reassess the degree of TTNtv enrichment in known titin regions and in exon 327, separately. In addition, we tried to explain exon 327 clustering in terms of nonsense-mediated mRNA decay (NMD) efficiency and a dominant negative mechanism recently proposed. Research papers focusing on TTNtvs found in patients with DCM were collected. A total of 612 patients with TTNtv-realated DCM were obtained from 10 studies. In the four regions of TTN and exon 327, the degree of TTNtvs enrichment was calculated in a way that the effect of distribution of highly expressed exons was normalized. As a result, exon 327 was the only region that showed significant enrichment for DCM-related TTNtv (p < .001). On the other hand, other A-band exons had almost the same number of TTNtv of random distribution. A review of RNAseq data revealed that the median allelic imbalance deviation of exon 327 TTNtvs was .04, indicating almost zero NMD. From these findings, we propose that the widely accepted A-band enrichment of DCM-related TTNtv is mostly attributable to exon 327 enrichment. In addition, based on the recently demonstrated dominant negative mechanism, the extremely low NMD efficiency seems to contribute to exon 327 enrichment.

Diversité des mycoendophytes foliaires de Limoniastrum feei (Girard) Batt. de Oued Aghlal (Béchar, Algérie) / Diversity of endophytic fungi associated with Limoniastrum feei leaves (Girard) Batt. of Oued Aghlal (Bechar, Algeria)

In this work, our interest was in isolating, identifying and listing foliar mycoendophytes present at Limoniastrum feei (Girard) Batt. Sampling involved 23 healthy subjects. Ten leaves were taken from each subject to be seeded on PDA medium. After two months of incubation, we measured a colonization frequency of 73.22 ± 4%, with a total of 842 endophytic fungal isolates, divided into 56 species and 20 genera. Species of the genus Penicillium, and those of the genus Aspergillus appeared as dominant, successively. These two genera known for their antimicrobial activities account for 45.79% of the mycoendophytes surveyed. Correlations sometimes positive and for other negative are described between the majority of fungal genera. Thus, the calculation of the diversity index revealed a remarkable richness of the endophytic mycoflora. The leaves of L. feei can be considered as a real hotspot of fungal biodiversity.

Kuru Tip Transformatörlerin Dış Ortamlarda Kullanılabilmesi İçin Deneysel Ve Simülasyon Ile Termal Analizine Yeni Yaklaşım

Since dry type transformers (DTT) has many advantages over the oily ones, this study focuses on the realibity, feasibility and cost of DTT to be used at outdoor applications. On this respect the core and winding temperatures of the 1500 VA DTT transformer model is measured by thermal camera The operational highest temperature of the transformer is obtained by this way. The DTT is simulated by ANSYS with the design parameters based On the physical model, and the simulation values and the real ones are compared to satisfy the procedure. Then in the light of simulation results, an outer cover is designed for outdoor applications which is the goal of the paper. The real hot spot temperature of the 1500 VA DTT is 129 ° C remains the same with the new cover simulation designed DTT that naturally cooled. Furthermore, the temperature of the new design DTT is reduced by about 4.6% to 123 ° C by forced cooling. So the new cover design not only provide to be used at outdoors applications, it also increases the lifetime of the device, and reduces the operation costs.

Correction of Winding Peak Temperature Detection in High-Frequency Automotive Electric Machines

The insulation material applied on the stator windings of automotive electric machines are susceptible to the excessive temperature rise. Typically, several thermocouples are embedded in the end-winding and the active winding in the slot to detect the peak temperatures in real-time to avoid thermal damage and adjust cooling. However, in the slot windings, the uneven distribution of power loss will change with frequency. This phenomenon causes the movement of the hotspot in the slot winding at different operating states, while it is not so obvious in the end-winding. As a result, the peak temperature in the slot winding cannot always be detected exactly by the fixed thermocouples, which has never been realized and valued. In this article, we analyze the movement of the hotspot in both of the slot winding and end-winding. In order to improve the detecting precision, we use an offline theoretical thermal-magnetic model to deduce the relationship between the temperatures at the measured position and real hotspot at various operating states. Then the thermocouple reading can be corrected in real-time according to the deduced relationship. The experimental test validates the performance of the proposed method in elevating the precision of peak temperature detection.

Controllable Synthesis and Growth Mechanism of Ceria Nanocubes by Template‐Free Hydrothermal Method

AbstractDifferent crystal planes of CeO2 have a different number of broken bonds, surface energy and catalytic activities, so preparing the CeO2 with different exposed planes has attracted extensive attention. In recent years, the preparation of CeO2 nanocubes with {100} exposed plane has been a real hotspot of research because of its good catalytic performance. Based on the research about the alkali concentration, reaction temperature and reaction time, the formation mechanism of CeO2 nanocubes was explored. It is believed that the dissolution‐recrystallization process is accelerated in the condition of strong base, high temperature and high pressure. In other word, the Ostwald ripening process is strengthened, which is the decisive factor for the formation of CeO2 nanocubes.

Analysis of the Effect of a Marine Energy Farm to Protect a Biosphere Reserve

Sacalin Peninsula in the Black Sea is a new land located south of the Saint George branch of the Danube. Since 1938 this area became a biosphere reserve since many rare species of animals and plants are to be found there. The generation of this new peninsula is due to the sedimentary process induced by the Danube River outflow and it was started more than 150 years ago. In the winter of 2013 this environment was seriously affected by some very strong storms putting in real danger this ecosystem. From this perspective, the objective of the present work is to evaluate the protection that might be offered to this area by a marine energy farm that would be deployed in front of the peninsula. In order to assess the coastal protection offered by the proposed solution, simulations with the SWAN (Simulating Waves Nearshore) wave model have been performed for the most relevant storm patterns. The results show that a marine energy farm can provide a real sheltering effect to the ecological reserve. Such approach seems to be also economically viable since this coastal environment represents a real hot spot in the Black Sea from the point of view of marine energy resources.

Malakofauna údolí Tiché Orlice [Mollusc fauna of the Tichá Orlice River valley

Altogether, 78 terrestrial mollusc species were recorded on 31 plots in a stretch of the Tichá Orlice River valley between the cities Choceň and Letohrad (East Bohemia, Czech Republic) in 2007 and 2009. This region harbours 46% of the total terrestrial mollusc fauna of the Czech Republic. The fairly high species richness corresponds to a high habitat diversity and species pool of the region that includes Alpine and Carpathian elements. Of prime conservation importance is a high share of rare and endangered species (EN-2, VU-9, NT-14 species) and species mostly having an isolated population there from the main distribution range. This region is a real hotspot of forest gastropods in Transalpine Europe.

Guest Editorial

Thermal energy storage is a key element for solar thermal applications and is of fundamental significance for improved thermal management in the sectors of industrial process heat and power generation. A characteristic of thermal storage systems is that they are diversified with respect to temperature, power level and heat transfer fluids for charging and discharging and that each application is characterized by its specific operation parameters. This requires the understanding of a broad portfolio of storage designs, media and methods.Today, available heat storage technologies suffer from insufficient energy densities, limited efficiency and reliability and investment costs, which are still too high. Such shortfalls are obstacles to a more wide-spread use and market penetration. To close this gap, material engineering issues as well as design and system integration aspects are in the focus of the relevant research and development efforts world-wide.This special issue of JSEE reflects the above situation. It contains 14 papers from 11 countries covering a broad range of measures on how to make thermal energy storage more reliable, efficient and—most importantly—more cost effective.Approximately two-thirds of the contributions focus on storage applications for heating and cooling, which indicates that this area is a real hot spot with current R&amp;D activities. Included are passive PCM storage approaches (Castellon et al. and Konuklu et al.) to improve thermal comfort in buildings as well as different sensible and PCM storage concepts for active solar systems. While sensible storage is the most common option for large-scale centralized storage systems (Ochs et al. and Choubani et al.), PCM storage is considered to be the most suitable solution to improve existing small-scale water storages (Martin et al. and Nallusamy et al.) or to be integrated in a solar heat pump heating system (Trinkl et al.). Furthermore, thermo-chemical heat storage is treated (v. Essen et al.), which is currently coming up in the research community as a new emerging concept to realize compact storage systems for seasonal storage. The second new research topic—the use of multi-functional fluids for absorbing solar radiation and storing of heat—is also included (Tyagi et al.).Heat storage for concentrating solar technology—the second important field for solar thermal applications—is treated by the remaining third of the papers. Improvement of the commercially available molten salt storage technology (Gabrielli et al.) for parabolic trough plants as well as an alternative concrete storage concept (Laing et al.) are considered. For the next generation of trough plants with direct steam generation, PCM storage is being under development as the most attractive solution. The paper of Steinmann et al. deals with material and design concepts to overcome the bottleneck of PCM storage—the non-sufficient heat conductivity of salt phase change media. The impact of latent heat storage integrated within high temperature receiver-reactors is investigated by Kodama et al. The important and overall question how to investigate thermo-physical properties and to characterize the new composite PCM based storage materials is also treated (Palomo et al.). Finally, the beam down concept (Ben-Zvi et al.) offers the potential to think about new design approaches for ground based directly radiated receiver-reactors or thermal energy storage units.Heat storage for solar systems is currently receiving increasing interest in the R&amp;D policy of several countries—e.g., in the US, Spain, France, Germany, and the EC. The number of contributions to JSEE in this area is expected to significantly increase.