scholarly journals Tropospheric NO2Trends over South Asia during the Last Decade (2004–2014) Using OMI Data

2015 ◽  
Vol 2015 ◽  
pp. 1-18 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zia ul-Haq ◽  
Salman Tariq ◽  
Muhammad Ali

The focus of this study is to assess spatiotemporal variability of tropospheric NO2over South Asia using data from spaceborne OMI during the past decade (2004–2015). We find an average value of NO21.0 ± 0.05 × 1015 molec/cm2and a significant decadal increase of 14%. The elevating NO2pollution over the region is linked to rise in motor vehicles and industrial and agricultural activities and increase in biomass fuel usage. The observed seasonality of NO2is associated with change in meteorological conditions and seasonal cycles of anthropogenic emissions. OMI data reveal a seasonal peak in spring followed by winter largely linked to metrological conditions and anthropogenic emissions from crop residue and biomass burning for heating purpose, and low concentration in summer is mostly attributed to meteorological conditions. Significant increase, up to 42%, in NO2concentrations over northwestern IGB, is observed connected to large scale postmonsoon crop residue events of 2010 and 2012. It is seen that NO2is mounting over all the hotspot locations and most of the cities. Dhaka shows the highest increase of 77% followed by Islamabad (69%), Kabul (68%), Korba (64%), Bardhaman (47%), and Lahore (40%). On the contrary, DG Khan has shown negative trend of −11%.

2010 ◽  
Vol 23 (6) ◽  
pp. 904-916 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yingxiu Zhang ◽  
Shurong Wang

Background: There is strong evidence of a positive secular trend in body mass index (BMI) and skinfold thickness (SFT) in most of the world over the past 10 years. However, no studies on this trend have been reported in Shandong Province, China. Aim: The present study assessed the decennial change in BMI and SFT in Shandong Province during the past 10 years and the prevalence of overweight and obesity among adolescents. Subjects and methods: The BMI and SFT of adolescents aged 7 to 18 years was calculated using data from 2 national surveys on students’ constitution and health carried out by the government in 1995 and 2005 in Shandong Province, China. The distribution of BMI and SFT was reported, and the prevalence of overweight and obesity were obtained according to the screening criteria of overweight and obesity for Chinese students using BMI. Results: In the past 10 years, the P50 (50th percentile) of BMI and SFT increased rapidly. The average increments of BMI and SFT were 0.91 kg/m2, 7.99 mm for boys and 0.55 kg/m2, 7.13 mm for girls, respectively. The prevalence of overweight and obesity increased rapidly: for overweight from 7.53% (boys), 4.89% (girls) in 1995 to 14.28% (boys), 8.75% (girls) in 2005; and for obesity from 2.92% (boys), 1.72% (girls) in 1995 to 10.78% (boys), 5.76% (girls) in 2005. Conclusion: The average value of BMI and SFT has increased over time; overweight and obesity among adolescents has become a serious public health problem. Comprehensive evidence-based strategies of intervention should be introduced, including periodic monitoring.


2017 ◽  
Vol 68 (4) ◽  
pp. 629 ◽  
Author(s):  
Serena H. Hamilton ◽  
Carmel A. Pollino ◽  
Keith F. Walker

Regionalisations based on species assemblages are a useful framework for characterising ecological communities and revealing patterns in the environment. In the present study, multivariate analyses are used to discern large-scale patterns in fish assemblages in the Murray–Darling Basin, based on information from the Murray–Darling Basin Authority’s first Sustainable Rivers Audit (SRA), conducted in 2004–2007. The Basin is classified into nine regions with similar historical fish assemblages (i.e. without major human intervention), using data that combine expert opinion, museum collections and historical records. These regions are (1) Darling Basin Plains, (2) Northern Uplands, (3) Murray Basin Plains, (4) Northern Alps, (5) Central East, (6) Avoca Lowland, (7) Southern Slopes, (8) Southern Alps and (9) South-Western Slopes. Associations between assemblages and physical variables (catchment area, elevation, hydrology, precipitation, temperature) are identified and used to reinforce the definitions of regions. Sustainable Rivers Audit data are compared with the historical assemblages, highlighting species whose range and abundance have changed since the early 19th century. Notable changes include declines in native species such as silver perch, river blackfish, mountain galaxias, Macquarie perch, trout cod and freshwater catfish, and the advent of alien species including common carp, eastern gambusia, goldfish, redfin perch, brown trout and rainbow trout. Less significant declines are evident for native carp gudgeons, golden perch, two-spined blackfish, bony herring and flathead gudgeon. Changes are evident even in regions where habitats have been little disturbed in the past 200 years.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Yoon-Hee Kang ◽  
Seunghee You ◽  
Minah Bae ◽  
Eunhye Kim ◽  
Kyuwon Son ◽  
...  

AbstractIn January 2020, anthropogenic emissions in Northeast Asia reduced due to the COVID-19 outbreak. When outdoor activities of the public were limited, PM2.5 concentrations in China and South Korea between February and March 2020 reduced by − 16.8 μg/m3 and − 9.9 μg/m3 respectively, compared with the average over the previous three years. This study uses air quality modeling and observations over the past four years to separate the influence of reductions in anthropogenic emissions from meteorological changes and emission control policies on this PM2.5 concentration change. Here, we show that the impacts of anthropogenic pollution reduction on PM2.5 were found to be approximately − 16% in China and − 21% in South Korea, while those of meteorology and emission policies were − 7% and − 8% in China, and − 5% and − 4% in South Korea, respectively. These results show that the influence on PM2.5 concentration differs across time and region and according to meteorological conditions and emission control policies. Finally, the influence of reductions in anthropogenic emissions was greater than that of meteorological conditions and emission policies during COVID-19 period.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lungwani Muungo

The purpose of this review is to evaluate progress inmolecular epidemiology over the past 24 years in canceretiology and prevention to draw lessons for futureresearch incorporating the new generation of biomarkers.Molecular epidemiology was introduced inthe study of cancer in the early 1980s, with theexpectation that it would help overcome some majorlimitations of epidemiology and facilitate cancerprevention. The expectation was that biomarkerswould improve exposure assessment, document earlychanges preceding disease, and identify subgroupsin the population with greater susceptibility to cancer,thereby increasing the ability of epidemiologic studiesto identify causes and elucidate mechanisms incarcinogenesis. The first generation of biomarkers hasindeed contributed to our understanding of riskandsusceptibility related largely to genotoxic carcinogens.Consequently, interventions and policy changes havebeen mounted to reduce riskfrom several importantenvironmental carcinogens. Several new and promisingbiomarkers are now becoming available for epidemiologicstudies, thanks to the development of highthroughputtechnologies and theoretical advances inbiology. These include toxicogenomics, alterations ingene methylation and gene expression, proteomics, andmetabonomics, which allow large-scale studies, includingdiscovery-oriented as well as hypothesis-testinginvestigations. However, most of these newer biomarkershave not been adequately validated, and theirrole in the causal paradigm is not clear. There is a needfor their systematic validation using principles andcriteria established over the past several decades inmolecular cancer epidemiology.


1987 ◽  
Vol 19 (5-6) ◽  
pp. 701-710 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. L. Reidy ◽  
G. W. Samson

A low-cost wastewater disposal system was commissioned in 1959 to treat domestic and industrial wastewaters generated in the Latrobe River valley in the province of Gippsland, within the State of Victoria, Australia (Figure 1). The Latrobe Valley is the centre for large-scale generation of electricity and for the production of pulp and paper. In addition other industries have utilized the brown coal resource of the region e.g. gasification process and char production. Consequently, industrial wastewaters have been dominant in the disposal system for the past twenty-five years. The mixed industrial-domestic wastewaters were to be transported some eighty kilometres to be treated and disposed of by irrigation to land. Several important lessons have been learnt during twenty-five years of operating this system. Firstly the composition of the mixed waste stream has varied significantly with the passage of time and the development of the industrial base in the Valley, so that what was appropriate treatment in 1959 is not necessarily acceptable in 1985. Secondly the magnitude of adverse environmental impacts engendered by this low-cost disposal procedure was not imagined when the proposal was implemented. As a consequence, clean-up procedures which could remedy the adverse effects of twenty-five years of impact are likely to be costly. The question then may be asked - when the total costs including rehabilitation are considered, is there really a low-cost solution for environmentally safe disposal of complex wastewater streams?


2019 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 4-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qihui Wu ◽  
Hanzhong Ke ◽  
Dongli Li ◽  
Qi Wang ◽  
Jiansong Fang ◽  
...  

Over the past decades, peptide as a therapeutic candidate has received increasing attention in drug discovery, especially for antimicrobial peptides (AMPs), anticancer peptides (ACPs) and antiinflammatory peptides (AIPs). It is considered that the peptides can regulate various complex diseases which are previously untouchable. In recent years, the critical problem of antimicrobial resistance drives the pharmaceutical industry to look for new therapeutic agents. Compared to organic small drugs, peptide- based therapy exhibits high specificity and minimal toxicity. Thus, peptides are widely recruited in the design and discovery of new potent drugs. Currently, large-scale screening of peptide activity with traditional approaches is costly, time-consuming and labor-intensive. Hence, in silico methods, mainly machine learning approaches, for their accuracy and effectiveness, have been introduced to predict the peptide activity. In this review, we document the recent progress in machine learning-based prediction of peptides which will be of great benefit to the discovery of potential active AMPs, ACPs and AIPs.


NASPA Journal ◽  
1998 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jackie Clark ◽  
Joan Hirt

The creation of small communities has been proposed as a way of enhancing the educational experience of students at large institutions. Using data from a survey of students living in large and small residences at a public research university, this study does not support the common assumption that small-scale social environments are more conducive to positive community life than large-scale social environments.


Author(s):  
Jeasik Cho

This book provides the qualitative research community with some insight on how to evaluate the quality of qualitative research. This topic has gained little attention during the past few decades. We, qualitative researchers, read journal articles, serve on masters’ and doctoral committees, and also make decisions on whether conference proposals, manuscripts, or large-scale grant proposals should be accepted or rejected. It is assumed that various perspectives or criteria, depending on various paradigms, theories, or fields of discipline, have been used in assessing the quality of qualitative research. Nonetheless, until now, no textbook has been specifically devoted to exploring theories, practices, and reflections associated with the evaluation of qualitative research. This book constructs a typology of evaluating qualitative research, examines actual information from websites and qualitative journal editors, and reflects on some challenges that are currently encountered by the qualitative research community. Many different kinds of journals’ review guidelines and available assessment tools are collected and analyzed. Consequently, core criteria that stand out among these evaluation tools are presented. Readers are invited to join the author to confidently proclaim: “Fortunately, there are commonly agreed, bold standards for evaluating the goodness of qualitative research in the academic research community. These standards are a part of what is generally called ‘scientific research.’ ”


2008 ◽  
Vol 4 (S254) ◽  
pp. 95-96
Author(s):  
Arthur M. Wolfe ◽  
Regina A. Jorgenson ◽  
Timothy Robishaw ◽  
Carl Heiles ◽  
Jason X. Prochaska

AbstractThe magnetic field pervading our Galaxy is a crucial constituent of the interstellar medium: it mediates the dynamics of interstellar clouds, the energy density of cosmic rays, and the formation of stars (Beck 2005). The field associated with ionized interstellar gas has been determined through observations of pulsars in our Galaxy. Radio-frequency measurements of pulse dispersion and the rotation of the plane of linear polarization, i.e., Faraday rotation, yield an average value B ≈ 3 μG (Han et al. 2006). The possible detection of Faraday rotation of linearly polarized photons emitted by high-redshift quasars (Kronberg et al. 2008) suggests similar magnetic fields are present in foreground galaxies with redshifts z > 1. As Faraday rotation alone, however, determines neither the magnitude nor the redshift of the magnetic field, the strength of galactic magnetic fields at redshifts z > 0 remains uncertain.Here we report a measurement of a magnetic field of B ≈ 84 μG in a galaxy at z =0.692, using the same Zeeman-splitting technique that revealed an average value of B = 6 μG in the neutral interstellar gas of our Galaxy (Heiles et al. 2004). This is unexpected, as the leading theory of magnetic field generation, the mean-field dynamo model, predicts large-scale magnetic fields to be weaker in the past, rather than stronger (Parker 1970).The full text of this paper was published in Nature (Wolfe et al. 2008).


2021 ◽  
pp. 1420326X2110036
Author(s):  
Qian Xu ◽  
Chan Lu ◽  
Rachael Gakii Murithi ◽  
Lanqin Cao

A cohort case–control study was conducted in XiangYa Hospital, Changsha, China, which involved 305 patients and 399 healthy women, from June 2010 to December 2018, to evaluate the association between Chinese women’s short- and long-term exposure to industrial air pollutant, SO2 and gynaecological cancer (GC). We obtained personal and family information from the XiangYa Hospital electronic computer medical records. Using data obtained from the air quality monitoring stations in Changsha, we estimated each woman’s exposure to the industrial air pollutant, sulphur dioxide (SO2), for different time windows, including the past 1, 5, 10 and 15 years before diagnosis of the disease. A multiple logistic regression model was used to assess the association between GC and SO2 exposure. GC was significantly associated with long-term SO2 exposure, with adjusted odds ratio (95% confidence interval) = 1.56 (1.10–2.21) and 1.81 (1.07–3.06) for a per interquartile range increase in the past 10 and 15 years, respectively. Sensitivity analysis showed that different groups reacted in different ways to long-term SO2 exposure. We concluded that long-term exposure to high concentration of industrial pollutant, SO2 is associated with the development of GC. This finding has implications for the prevention and reduction of GC.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document