Experimental and molecular dynamics study into the surfactant effect upon coal wettability.

In order to improve the wettability and permeability of coal seams, the water injection efficiency of coal seams has to be boosted, the amount of dust generation has to be reduced, and coal and gas outburst must be prevented, and a surfactant is used to modulate the coal surface wettability. In this work, taking coal samples from Pingdingshan mine in Henan as the research object, their surface chemistry was initially scrutinized and then coal surface engineering via surfactants was inspected by a contact angle test. The coal wettability was ameliorated with surfactants, particularly using the 1 wt% non-ionic surfactant Triton X-100, which elicited a 47% lower contact angle than the raw coal. The surface free energy of the coal sample modified by 1.0 wt% Triton X-100 was increased from 44.51 mN m-1 to 49.52 mN m-1. The microstructural characteristics of coal samples allowed leveraging the Wiser model to construct three kinds of surfactant-coal adsorption models to dissect the adsorption configuration of the system. The results indicate that the addition of surfactants increases both the interaction of water with the coal and the diffusion coefficient of water molecules, resulting in the coal surface transformation from hydrophobicity to hydrophilicity. Our current work can provide salutary guidance and reference for coal water injection and dust suppression.

A Potential Anti-cancer Compound Separated from the Chloroform Extract of the Chinese Medicine Formula Shenqi San.

This study examined anti-cancer compounds present in the chloroform extract of the Chinese medicine formula Shenqi San (CE-SS). Silica gel column chromatography, Sephadex LH-20, octadecylsilyl (ODS) column chromatography, and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) were used to separate the compounds from CE-SS. The structural formulas of the separated compounds were determined using 1D 1H and 13C experiments as well as high resolution electrospray ionization mass spectroscopy (HRESIMS). The corresponding results were compared with the reported literature data. A total of six compounds were separated and their structures were identified on the basis of corresponding spectroscopic and physico-chemical properties. They were Saikogenin F (I), Prosaikogenin D (II), Prosaikogenin F (III), ß-sitosterol (IV), 3ß,16ß,23-trihydroxy-13,28-epoxyurs-11-ene-3-O-ß-D-glucopyranoside (V), and methyl ursolic acid (VI). The separated compounds were evaluated in vitro for their inhibitory ability against the proliferation of A549 cells via MTT assay. Apoptosis was investigated using Annexin V-FITC/propidium iodide (PI) by flow cytometry. Apoptosis-associated proteins were examined by Western blotting. All the compounds were observed to have inhibitory activities against the proliferation of A549 cells to different degrees. Flow cytometry showed that compound V increased the proportion of apoptotic A549 cells in a dose-dependent manner. Western blotting showed that compound V increased the expression of Bax, cleaved-caspase-3, cleaved-caspase-9 and cleaved-poly ADP-ribose polymerase (PARP), and decreased the expression of Bcl-2. These results indicated that compound V featured a significant inhibitory effect on A549 cells when compared with other compounds, and it may be considered a potential drug against cancers.

[Marine Emission Inventory and Its Temporal and Spatial Characteristics in the City of Shenzhen].

To analyze the characteristic of marine emission in Shenzhen City, activity-based and fuel-based approaches were utilized to develop the marine emission inventory for the year of 2010, using the vessel files from the Lloyd's register of shipping (LR) and vessel track data from the automatic identification system (AIS). The marine emission inventory was temporally (resolution: 1 hour) and spatially (resolution: 1 km x 1 km) allocated based on the vessel track data. Results showed that total emissions of SO2, NO(x), CO, PM10, PM2.5 and VOCs from marine vessels in Shenzhen City were about 13.6 x 10(3), 23.3 x 10(3), 2.2 x 10(3), 1.9 x 10(3), 1.7 x 10(3) and 1. x 10(3) t, respectively. Among various types of marine vessels, emission from container vessels was the highest; for different driving modes, hotelling mode was found with the largest mission. Marine emissions were generally higher in the daytime, with vessel-specific peaks. For spatial distributions, in general, marine emissions were zonally distributed with hot spots in the western port group, Dapeng Bay and the key waterway.