Artiles
Open Access
Article
31 July 2026Non-Destructive Testing of Multilayer Composite Materials
Multilayer composite materials are used in advanced engineering as a material for heavy-duty products. However, the use of multilayer composite materials requires consideration of their inherent specific properties, such as anisotropy of mechanical characteristics and the possibility of the presence of hidden defects in the form of discontinuity of the material along the interfaces of individual layers (laminations). Evaluation of interlayer failures throughout the life cycle is critical to reducing composite product safety risks. In this article, the analysis of interlayer defects in composites employs comprehensive control, including several non-destructive testing methods: visual inspection, ultrasonic flaw detection, active thermography, and numerical modeling. Interlayer defects obtained as a result of low and high-speed impact on multilayer composite materials are considered. It has been found that the results from numerical modulation of interlayer defects and from non-destructive inspection of defects such as laminations, obtained by different methods, agree satisfactorily.
Open Access
Article
31 July 2026The Lanthanum-Modified Zeolite for Efficient Removal of Glyphosate: Adsorption Behaviors and Mechanisms
Glyphosate is one of the most extensively used organophosphorus herbicides; however, its excessive application and environmental residues have severely threatened aquatic ecosystems and human health. In this study, a highly efficient lanthanum-modified zeolite (LMZ) adsorbent was synthesized via a hydrothermal method, and its adsorption behaviors and underlying mechanisms for glyphosate removal were systematically investigated. LMZ exhibited exceptional adsorption performance over a broad pH range of 3.0–7.0, achieving a maximum adsorption capacity of 217.39 mg/g. The adsorption process was well described by the Langmuir isotherm and pseudo-second-order kinetic models, indicating a monolayer chemisorption process. Notably, LMZ demonstrated remarkable adsorption selectivity and excellent regenerability, maintaining a high adsorption capacity even after five consecutive adsorption-desorption cycles. In practical application assessments with simulated wastewater, glyphosate removal efficiency exceeded 90% at an adsorbent dosage of 7.5 g/L. Furthermore, dynamic column experiments confirmed that LMZ could maintain effective continuous adsorption, highlighting its substantial application potential for treating glyphosate-contaminated wastewater. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and Raman spectroscopic characterizations revealed that this outstanding adsorption capability is primarily driven by inner-sphere complexation induced by ligand exchange at the La-OH active sites.
Open Access
Article
31 July 2026International Policies in the Face of Climate and Human Impacts Occurring in the Sahel
The Sahel is a strip of land that begins in Mauritania and ends in Eritrea. It is approximately 5400 km long and varies in width from 100 to 1000 km. Based on different historical perspectives, the Sahel can be considered to encompass a total of five countries. Subsequently, other countries have been added that, due to their geographical and climatic characteristics, can be considered Sahelian. The Sahelian countries emerged after 1960, the year in which decolonization began, but also the instability that was initially triggered by military coups aimed at destabilizing power. Later, climatic instability, famine, political instability, terrorism, and other factors have also played a role. This essay focuses on analyzing the actions and current activities of certain actors in the Sahel.
Open Access
Article
31 July 2026Fine-Scale Taxonomic and Functional Diversity Patterns Inform Within-Site Sampling Strategies for Benthic Macroinvertebrates in an Alpine Stream
Fine-scale habitat heterogeneity can generate marked short-distance variation in alpine-stream benthic macroinvertebrate assemblages, yet routine surveys often characterize a site using five Surber-net replicates collected within an approximately 100 m reach. We analyzed 99 quantitative samples collected at 10 m intervals along a 1 km reach of Qingbixi Stream on Cangshan Mountain, Dali, Yunnan, China, to relate taxonomic and functional diversity patterns to within-site sampling design. The samples contained 69 taxa and 15,034 individuals. Across 20 consecutive 50 m sections, turnover accounted for 70.9% of mean total pairwise taxonomic beta diversity, whereas nestedness accounted for 96.3% of mean total functional trait-state beta diversity. Taxonomic dissimilarity increased weakly but significantly with longitudinal distance. In ten simulated nominal 100 m sampling units, five spatial replicates detected an average of 82.9% of the locally observed taxon pool; completeness increased to 87.4% with six replicates and 94.6% with eight. These results support five replicates as a practical baseline for routine community characterization, while more intensive or microhabitat-stratified sampling is preferable when near-complete taxon detection or fine-scale beta-diversity assessment is required.
Sampling design
Open Access
Review
31 July 2026From Physical Amplification to Biological Effect: The Evolving Landscape of Nucleic Acid Nanomedicines in Radio-Immunotherapy
Radiotherapy (RT) remains a mainstay of cancer treatment, but its efficacy is limited by radioresistance and immunosuppression. Nucleic acid therapeutics, including siRNA, microRNA modulators, antisense oligonucleotides, aptamers, CpG oligodeoxynucleotides, and CRISPR systems, can remodel tumor responses at multiple levels. Nanotechnology enables their precise delivery, protection, and spatiotemporal activation. This review synthesizes recent advances in nucleic acid-enabled radiosensitization across four dimensions: (1) precise delivery via passive/active targeting and radiation-triggered release; (2) target selection from dominant-node inhibition to coordinated network regulation; (3) immune remodeling from checkpoint blockade to active immune instruction; and (4) multimodal integration where RT serves as a biological switch. We formally define programmable radio-nanomedicine as the co-design of nucleic acid cargo, carrier logic, activation trigger, and radiation schedule so that irradiation acts as a context-defining event. Translational barriers and a framework for next-generation design are discussed.
Open Access
Article
30 July 2026Normalized Source-Storage-Load Flexibility-Loss Indicators for Day-Ahead Scheduling of Renewable Virtual Power Plants
Renewable virtual power plants (VPPs) require day-ahead schedules that coordinate renewable generation, storage, gas turbines, and demand-side flexibility while retaining interpretable operating signals. This paper develops a normalized source-storage-load flexibility-loss-indicator (FLI) framework for renewable VPP scheduling. The indicators are engineering proxies for renewable-curtailment value loss, storage availability loss, and interruptible-load activation burden, rather than market-settled opportunity costs or a complete uncertainty-risk measure. The scalar objective combines net operating cost, operating coordination cost, and normalized FLI terms with reference scales fixed within each comparative setting. In a PJM-scaled day-ahead scheduling case, the baseline, scalarized multi-term reference, and proposed FLI schedules achieved net operating profits of 69,590.98 USD, 60,377.26 USD, and 66,856.81 USD. The proposed schedule reduced SOC boundary contacts from 9 to 3 and equivalent full cycles from 1.7253 to 1.6647, with a 3.93% profit concession relative to the baseline. Weight sensitivity, channel ablation, and eight representative operating and stress-test scenarios show state-dependent effects: the storage channel was active in seven scenarios, the interruptible-load channel under peak and flexibility-stressed conditions, and the renewable channel remained weak because curtailment was nearly zero. The framework provides a diagnostic coordination signal for renewable VPP operation.
Open Access
Article
30 July 2026Parent-Offspring Conflict and Age at Weaning in British Cohort
Evolutionary theory has been applied to help understand and predict parenting decisions. Parent-offspring conflict theory posits that conflicts between mothers and infants are inevitable because they share only half of their genes. A prediction drawn from this body of theory is that infants will typically benefit from later weaning than the timing that most benefits the mother, who has other arenas in which she must allocate her energy to ensure her family has enough resources, that her other children are cared for, and that she has energy to allocate to future pregnancies. This research tested whether the timing of weaning from breastmilk, measured as the maternally reported age at which their infant last breastfed, is consistent with expectations from parent-offspring conflict theory in the UK Millennium Cohort. Cox proportional hazards models predicting age last breastfed for the entire sample, including those never breastfed (adjusted model N = 15,825), and models for the subsample who ever breastfed were carried out (adjusted model N = 9678). Many of the results were consistent with predictions, including for variables that would not logically link to early weaning without thinking from an evolutionary perspective, such as preeclampsia (HR for weaning ever-breastfed infants = 1.08; 95% CI 1.00–1.17), and birthweight (HR for each 1 kg increment = 0.90; 95% CI 0.88–0.93). Older mothers weaned their infants later (HR for each year of maternal age = 0.94; 95% CI 0.92–0.97). The findings are discussed from evolutionary and public health perspectives as an example of the utility of evolutionary thinking for understanding health-related behaviours.
Open Access
Article
30 July 2026Water–Energy–Food Nexus and Circular Economy Analysis of Melon (Cucumis melo L.) and Grape (Vitis vinifera L.) Value Chains: A Life Cycle, Water Footprint, and Exergy Assessment with Turkish Case Studies
This study applies an integrated water–energy–food (WEF) nexus approach to melon and grape value chains, combining life cycle assessment, water footprinting (blue/green/grey), carbon footprint, and exergy analysis within a circular economy framework. Türkiye, the fourth-largest melon producer (~1.7 Mt/yr) with over 80 indigenous grape cultivars, serves as the primary case study, supplemented by global data. In the wine chain, cultivation (37%) and glass packaging (28%) dominate global warming potential (GWP), with a baseline of 1.38 kg CO2eq per 0.75 L bottle (ReCiPe 2016-H). Recovering pomace bioethanol, polyphenolic extracts, grape seed oil, and tartaric acid in a circular economy scenario lowers the footprint to 1.12 kg CO2eq (−19%). Turkish wine grapes exhibit blue-water shares of 38–41%, well above the global 25%, reflecting irrigation reliance in semi-arid Anatolia (Elazığ, Diyarbakır, Cappadocia). Exergy analysis identifies refrigeration as the top energy sink (280 MJ/t grapes, 32%) and primary exergy destruction site (193 MJ/t; second-law efficiency: 31%). Fermentation records the lowest exergy efficiency (28%) due to the irreversibility of sugar-to-ethanol conversion. These findings demonstrate that combining WEF nexus management with circular bioeconomy strategies can substantially reduce the overall environmental burden, particularly in water-stressed agricultural regions.
Open Access
Article
30 July 2026Utilization of Post-Consumer Cotton Waste for Industrial Applications
The accumulation of post-consumer cotton textile waste brings environmental challenges and opportunities for resource recovery. In this work, cotton waste was valorized into nitrocellulose via a pure nitration method, and its potential as a multifunctional material was systematically assessed. Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was used to optimize the process parameters with a Box-Behnken design, and the results indicated that nitric acid concentration was the most important parameter affecting nitrogen incorporation. The optimized process produced nitrocellulose with a Nitrogen content of 11.17%, as confirmed by CHNS analysis. However, the FTIR results confirmed that the nitrocellulose was successfully nitrated, as evidenced by the nitro group absorption bands. The produced nitrocellulose was evaluated in various applications, including pyrotechnic green mixtures, adhesive systems, and film production. Gas emission analysis indicated a nitrogen-rich and comparatively cleaner combustion profile. The adhesive test showed moderate bonding to cellulosic materials, whereas the tensile test of films showed a high tensile strength of 60.8–65.8 MPa. The findings indicate that multifunctional nitrocellulose can be successfully produced from post-consumer cotton waste, providing a viable alternative to textile waste recycling methods and adding to efforts to build a sustainable circular economy.
Open Access
Article
29 July 2026Energy Effectiveness and Economic Competitiveness of Two Emerging Solar Space Heating Technologies
This study provides a comprehensive long-term energy performance evaluation comparing traditional solar space heating systems (water and air collectors) with emerging alternatives, namely photovoltaic (PV)-driven heat pumps and photothermal solar heat extractors. The comparison is performed per unit collection area under idealized heat use and storage assumptions, rather than as a full building-level heating system analysis. Utilizing hourly meteorological and radiometric data from Rock Springs, US (2001–2022), the results reveal that while solar water heat extractors are more efficient than traditional heaters, their heating gain factor remains below 1.2, whereas emerging solar air heat extractors demonstrate low future potential. Over annual cycles, crystalline silicon PV-driven heat pumps outperform traditional solar water heating due to their superior efficiency under the low-to-moderate solar irradiance levels that dominate the heating season, despite traditional systems performing better at peak heat fluxes. Ultimately, this underscores that long-term technology dominance is strictly non-linear and governed by local radiative climates. Complementing the technical study, a preliminary economic screening is performed based strictly on component capital costs, without factoring in long-term operational dynamics such as maintenance, degradation, or discounting. Within this simplified financial framework, the analysis indicates that crystalline silicon or CdTe PV-driven heat pumps can viably replace solar water collectors (unless domestic hot water is a primary requirement) or expensive closed-circuit air collectors. Conversely, solar heat extractors remain viable only in niche applications with exceptionally high thermal energy costs exceeding 0.25 USD/kWh. By establishing these boundary thresholds, this work provides a streamlined decision-making framework that identifies the economic domains in which emerging PV-heat pump configurations achieve market viability relative to traditional thermal systems.