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Members of Ascomycota, Basidiomycota, Blastocladiomycota and Mucoromycota dominated fungal assemblages on plastics. Co-occurrence network analysis revealed that the biotic interactions between bacteria and fungi on MPs were less complex than those on PE and PP sheets. The three types of plastics shared no keystone taxa. The functional profiles (KEGG) predicted by Tax4Fun showed that the pathways of alanine, aspartate, glutamate and biotin metabolism were enriched in biofilms on MPs. Nonetheless, the higher complexity of plastic sheet-associated biofilms might make them more resistant to environmental perturbation and facilitate the maintenance of microbial activities.Integrated ultrafiltration (UF) membrane-based processes are promising drinking water treatment technologies. However, the membrane module always remains static, resulting in membrane fouling through the gradual formation of a thick cake layer. As floc-based cake layers are loose, in the present study, a membrane module spiral rotation was introduced with the aim of regulating the cake layers. The cake layer thickness readily decreased and the UF membrane fouling was alleviated. The results showed that Al-based flocs were not easily removed from the membrane surface during rotation due to its low density; as a result, the likelihood of humic acid (HA) reaching the membrane surface was low. Computational fluid dynamics indicated that a strong shearing force was generated with high rotation height. Thus, the cake layer thickness was easily regulated, and the UF membrane fouling was further alleviated. However, the floc-based cake layer could be broken by strong shearing forces, thereby allowing HA molecules to directly reach the membrane surface and further aggravating membrane fouling. In comparison to alkaline condition, the UF membrane performed better under acidic conditions, particularly in terms of HA removal, due to the smaller floc size and higher positive charge. Additionally, excellent UF membrane performance was also observed when treating raw water, indicating the potential application.Population growth, demographic transitions and urbanization in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) will increase non-communicable disease (NCD) burden. We studied the association between neighborhood greenness and NCDs in a multi-country cross-sectional study. Among 1178 participants, in adjusted models, a 0.11 unit NDVI increase was associated with lower BMI (β -1.01, 95% CI -1.35, -0.67), and lower odds of overweight/obesity (aOR 0.73, 95% CI 0.62, 0.85), diabetes (aOR 0.77, 95% CI 0.62, 0.96), and having ≥3 allostatic load components compared to none (aOR 0.66, 95% CI 0.52, 0.85). Except for diabetes, these remained statistically significant after Bonferroni correction. We observed no association between NDVI and hypertension or cholesterol. Our findings are consistent with health benefits of neighborhood greenness reported in other countries, suggesting greening strategies could be considered as part of broader public health interventions for NCDs.The recently emerged coronavirus disease (COVID-19), which has been characterised as a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO), is impacting all parts of human society including agriculture, manufacturing, and tertiary sectors involving all service provision industries. This paper aims to give an overview of potential host reservoirs that could cause pandemic outbreak caused by zoonotic transmission. Amongst all, continues surveillance in slaughterhouse for possible pathogens transmission is needed to prevent next pandemic outbreak. This paper also summarizes the potential threats of pandemic to agriculture and aquaculture sector that control almost the total food supply chain and market. The history lesson from the past, emerging and reemerging infectious disease including the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in 2002, Influenza A H1N1 (swine flu) in 2009, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) in 2012 and the recent COVID-19 should give us some clue to improve especially the governance to be more ready for next coming pandemic.In many countries water disinfection for human consumption is still carried out via chlorination which generates by-products such as trihalomethanes (THM). Exposure to THM constitutes a public health risk as such substances are known to be carcinogenic. This study evaluated exposure to THMs by inhalation in showers and assessed the carcinogenic risk for lifetime exposure. The study population involved students at Universidad de los Andes residing in Bogotá, Colombia. The risk assessment was performed stochastically and the exposure parameters were taken as probability distributions. Most variables were measured in relation to the chosen population. The risk was calculated using two different methodologies but no significant variations were obtained. The average risk calculated for men and women was 56 cases in a million (5.6 × 10-5). A sensitivity analysis was carried out where it was found that the parameters that increase risk the most are the concentration of chloroform in the water, exposure time, and the volume of the shower cubicle.Long-term exposure to air pollution has been related to mortality in several epidemiological studies. The investigations have assessed exposure using various methods achieving different accuracy in predicting air pollutants concentrations. The comparison of the health effects estimates are therefore challenging. This paper aims to compare the effect estimates of the long-term effects of air pollutants (particulate matter with aerodynamic diameter less than 10 μm, PM10, and nitrogen dioxide, NO2) on cause-specific mortality in the Rome Longitudinal Study, using exposure estimates obtained with different models and spatial resolutions. Annual averages of NO2 and PM10 were estimated for the year 2015 in a large portion of the Rome urban area (12 × 12 km2) applying three modelling techniques available at increasing spatial resolution 1) a chemical transport model (CTM) at 1km resolution; 2) a land-use random forest (LURF) approach at 200m resolution; 3) a micro-scale Lagrangian particle dispersion model (PMSS) ta021) and 1.018 (1.007, 1.028) for the different NO2 estimates, and between 1.010 (1.000, 1.020) and 1.020 (1.008, 1.031) for PM10, with a tendency of larger effect for lower resolution exposures. The latter was even stronger when a fixed value of 10 μg/m3 is used to calculate HRs. Long-term effects of air pollution on mortality in Rome were consistent across different models for exposure assessment, and different spatial resolutions.

Peptic ulcer disease (PUD) continued to be a source of significant morbidity and mortality worldwide. Recently, it has been reported that exposure to air pollution is a potential risk factor for PUD, but evidence on the association still remains inconsistent.

We performed an ecological study to examine the association between short-term exposure to air pollution and daily hospital visits for PUD in Yinzhou, China from January 1st, 2017 to December 31st, 2019. Distributed lag nonlinear models were used to estimate the nonlinear and lag-response effects of air pollutants. Subgroup analyses stratified by sex, age and season were conducted to examine the effect modifications.

Overall, we found that short-term exposure to air pollution including SO

, NO

, CO, O

and PM

was significantly associated with hospital visits for PUD among all subjects. read more The lag-response effects of SO

, NO

and O

varied at different concentrations and lag days. The cumulative risk ratios of CO and PM

showed nearly linear adverse effects and increased to maxima of 2.68 (95% CI 1.49-4.78) and 2.40 (95% CI 1.36-4.24) with their ranges from the references to the maximum concentrations, respectively. Moreover, the cumulative risks of particulate matters on hospital visits for PUD increased significantly in cold seasons, but not in warm seasons.

Our findings could provide growing evidence regarding the adverse health effects of air pollution on PUD, thereby strengthening the hypothesis that air pollutants have harmful impacts on digestive system.

Our findings could provide growing evidence regarding the adverse health effects of air pollution on PUD, thereby strengthening the hypothesis that air pollutants have harmful impacts on digestive system.When localising sounds in space the brain relies on internal models that specify the correspondence between the auditory input reaching the ears, initial head-position and coordinates in external space. These models can be updated throughout life, setting the basis for re-learning spatial hearing abilities in adulthood. In addition, strategic behavioural adjustments allow people to quickly adapt to atypical listening situations. Until recently, the potential role of dynamic listening, involving head-movements or reaching to sounds, have remained largely overlooked. Here, we exploited visual virtual reality (VR) and real-time kinematic tracking, to study the role of active multisensory-motor interactions when hearing individuals adapt to altered binaural cues (one ear plugged and muffed). Participants were immersed in a VR scenario showing 17 virtual speakers at ear-level. In each trial, they heard a sound delivered from a real speaker aligned with one of the virtual ones and were instructed to either reach-to-touch the perceived sound source (Reaching group), or read the label associated with the speaker (Naming group). Participants were free to move their heads during the task and received audio-visual feedback on their performance. Most importantly, they performed the task under binaural or monaural listening. Results show that both groups adapted rapidly to monaural listening, improving sound localisation performance across trials and changing their head-movement behaviour. Reaching the sounds induced faster and larger sound localisation improvements, compared to just naming its position. This benefit was linked to progressively wider head-movements to explore auditory space, selectively in the Reaching group. In conclusion, reaching to sounds in an immersive visual VR context proved most effective for adapting to altered binaural listening. Head-movements played an important role in adaptation, pointing to the importance of dynamic listening when implementing training protocols for improving spatial hearing.It has been hypothesized that embodied mechanisms encompassing the simulation of actions, emotions and corporeal sensations contribute to aesthetic appreciation of art. In line with this, in this study we assessed whether there is a relationship between the extent to which an artwork triggers motor resonance mechanisms and liking for the artwork. To this aim, we measured motor evoked potentials (MEPs) induced by TMS over M1 whilst participants viewed a series of paintings depicting either humans in static postures or performing dynamic actions, and paintings depicting static or dynamic non-human scenes. Following recording of MEPs, participants indicated how much they liked each painting and found the painting to be dynamic. Viewing of paintings depicting dynamic human actions was associated with a significant increase in MEPs size compared to baseline and to viewing of the other paintings. The more the painting conveyed the impression of a dynamic human action, the higher the MEPs amplitude and the more the artwork was liked.