Degradation is one of the key processes governing the impact of pharmaceuticals in the aquatic environment. Most studies on the degradation of pharmaceuticals have focused on soil and sludge, with fewer exploring persistence in aquatic sediments. We investigated the dissipation of 6 pharmaceuticals from different therapeutic classes in a range of sediment types. Dissipation of each pharmaceutical was found to follow first‐order exponential decay. Half‐lives in the sediments ranged from 9.5 (atenolol) to 78.8 (amitriptyline) d. Under sterile conditions, the persistence of pharmaceuticals was considerably longer. Stepwise multiple linear regression analysis was performed to explore the relationships between half‐lives of the pharmaceuticals, sediment physicochemical properties, and sorption coefficients for the compounds. Sediment clay, silt, and organic carbon content and microbial activity were the predominant factors related to the degradation rates of diltiazem, cimetidine, and ranitidine. Regression analysis failed to highlight a key property which may be responsible for observed differences in the degradation of the other pharmaceuticals. The present results suggest that the degradation rate of pharmaceuticals in sediments is determined by different factors and processes and does not exclusively depend on a single sediment parameter.
In this work, diamond-like carbon (DLC) thin films were prepared from Cyclohexane. Thin films were deposited on quartz substrate by atmospheric pressure Argon plasma jet system. The plasma jet system was applying high voltage sinusoidal waves of frequency 28 kHz and potential difference of 7.5kV peak to peak across the electrodes. The effect of annealing at 400, 500 and 600 °C under vacuum for two hours on optical properties and structural properties of the DLC thin films were investigated. This effect was clarified by X-ray diffraction (XRD), FTIR, UV-Visible absorption, Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Raman Spectroscopy. The X-ray diffraction patterns for the annealing DLC thin films show two broad peaks at 2θ, 26.62° and 51.58
... Show More<p>Analyzing X-rays and computed tomography-scan (CT scan) images using a convolutional neural network (CNN) method is a very interesting subject, especially after coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. In this paper, a study is made on 423 patients’ CT scan images from Al-Kadhimiya (Madenat Al Emammain Al Kadhmain) hospital in Baghdad, Iraq, to diagnose if they have COVID or not using CNN. The total data being tested has 15000 CT-scan images chosen in a specific way to give a correct diagnosis. The activation function used in this research is the wavelet function, which differs from CNN activation functions. The convolutional wavelet neural network (CWNN) model proposed in this paper is compared with regular convol
... Show MoreIn this work, two cone-inverted cylindrical and cross-hybrid dielectric resonator antennas are stacked and excited by the coaxial probe method with an operating standard resonant frequency of 5.438 GHz. A drawback of these standard Dielectric Resonator Antennas (DRAs) is their narrow bandwidth. For good antenna performance, a stacked DR geometry and a thick dielectric substrate having a low dielectric constant are desired since this provides large bandwidth, better radiation power, reduces conductor loss and nonappearance of surface waves. Many approaches, such as changing the shape of the dielectric resonator, have been used to enhance bandwidth. Using DRA, having the lowest dielectric constant, increases the bandwidth and the electroma
... Show MoreUnder aerobic and anaerobic conditions, two laboratory-scale reactors were operated. Each reactor
was packed with 8.5 kg of shredded synthetic solid waste (less than 5 cm) that was prepared according to an
average composition of domestic solid waste in the city of Kirkuk. Using an air compressor, aerobic
conditions were created in the aerobic reactor. This study shows that the aerobic reactor was more efficient in
COD and BOD5 removal which were 97.88% and 91.25% while in case of anaerobic reactor, they were
66.53%and 19.11%, respectively.
The ligand Schiff base [(E)-3-(2-hydroxy-5-methylbenzylideneamino)- 1- phenyl-1H-pyrazol-5(4H) –one] with some metals ion as Mn(II); Co(II); Ni(II); Cu(II); Cd(II) and Hg(II) complexes have been preparation and characterized on the basic of mass spectrum for L, elemental analyses, FTIR, electronic spectral, magnetic susceptibility, molar conductivity measurement and functions thermodynamic data study (∆H°, ∆S° and ∆G°). Results of conductivity indicated that all complexes were non electrolytes. Spectroscopy and other analytical studies reveal distorted octahedral geometry for all complexes. The antibacterial activity of the ligand and preparers metal complexes was also studied against gram and negative bacteria.
In this work was prepared three different types of modified screen printed carbon electrode (SPCEs) with drops casted method, the used carbone nanomaterials were the MWCNT, functionalized –MWCNT (f-MWCNT) and After several experiments were made to find an appropriate ratio to make good GOT/f-MWCNT nanocomposite, and found the suspension mixture (1:1) from GOT/f-MWCNT (f-MWCNT-GOT). The electrical and physical properties were performed with cyclic voltammeter technique, and studied the maximum current response, the effective surface area, effect of the pH value and the determination of active surface area for MWCNT-SPCE , f-MWCNT-SPCE and f-MWCNT-GOT/SPCE as (0.04 cm2), (0.119 cm2) and (0.115 cm2) respectively, the surface coverage concent
... Show MoreIn this research, the removal of cadmium (Cd) from simulated wastewater was investigated by using a fixed bed bio-electrochemical reactor. The effects of the main controlling factors on the performance of the removal process such as applied cell voltage, initial Cd concentration, pH of the catholyte, and the mesh number of the cathode were investigated. The results showed that the applied cell voltage had the main impact on the removal efficiency of cadmium where increasing the applied voltage led to higher removal efficiency. Meanwhile increasing the applied voltage was found to be given lower current efficiency and higher energy consumption. No significant effect of initial Cd concentration on the removal efficiency of cadmium b
... Show MoreBaTiO3 thin films have been deposited on Si (111) and glass substrates by using pulsed laser deposition technique. The films were characterized by using X-ray diffraction, atomic force microscope and optical transmission spectra. The films growth on Si after annealing at 873K showed a polycrystalline nature, and exhibited tetragonal structure, while on glass substrate no growth was noticed at that temperature. UV-VIS transmittance measurements showed that the films are highly transparent in the visible wavelength region and near-infrared region for sample annealing on glass substrate. The optical gap of the film were calculated from the curve of absorption coefficient (αhν) 2 vs. hν and was found tobe 3.6 eV at substrate temperature 5
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