In this study, two different mixtures of municipal compost, limestone and zero-valent iron were assessed in two column experiments on acid rock treatment. The effluent solution was systematically analysed throughout the experiments and precipitates from both columns were withdrawn for scanning electron microscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and X-ray diffractometry were analyzed. Resu...

Understanding variation of plant nutrients is largely limited to nitrogen and to a lesser extent phosphorus. Here we analyse patterns of variation in 11 elements (nitrogen/phosphorus/potassium/calcium/magnesium/sulphur/silicon/iron/sodium/manganese/aluminium) in leaves of 1900 plant species across China. The concentrations of these elements show significant latitudinal and longitudinal trends, ...

Ulrich (1981) supposes in the hypothesis of humusdisintegration that the balance between polymerisation and breakdown of organic material may be disturbed in chemically well buffered European forest soils. This new aspect of aluminium toxicity may cause nitrogen exceedance in forest ecosystems and subsequent seasonal nitrate output (Eichhorn and Hutterman, 1999). In a research program the subst...

The aim of this paper is to focus on the effect of cryogenic treatment on the microstructure, mechanical and wear properties of Al 6061 and Al 8011.  The first objective was to understand the degree to which hardness of these aluminium grades have been enhanced by giving  cryogenic on the specimens. The second objective is to check the wear resistance property of these two aluminium specimens i...

Long-term consumption of water containing excessive fluoride can lead to fluorosis of the teeth and bones. Electrocoagulation (EC) is an electrochemical technique, in which a variety of unwanted dissolved particles and suspended matter can be effectively removed from an aqueous solution by electrolysis. Continuous flow experiments with monopolar aluminium electrodes for fluoride removal were un...

Energetic liquids function mainly as fuels due to low energy densities and slow combustion kinetics. Consequently, these properties can be significantly increased through the addition of metal nanomaterials such as aluminium. Unfortunately, nanoparticle additives are restricted to low mass fractions in liquids because of increased viscosities and severe particle agglomeration. Nanoscale protein...

Exoelectrogenic bacteria can couple their metabolism to extracellular electron acceptors, including macroscopic electrodes, and this has applications in energy production, bioremediation and biosensing. Optimisation of these technologies relies on a detailed molecular understanding of extracellular electron-transfer (EET) mechanisms, and Shewanella oneidensis MR-1 (MR-1) has become a model orga...

introduction activated sludge process is one of the most common methods used in wastewater treatment plants. regarding the large volume of sludge obtained from such biological wastewater treatment processes and considerable costs of its treatment and disposal, extensive research has been and is being done on novel effective methods of sludge stabilization. in previous investigations research gr...

Originating from the Fertile Crescent in the Middle East, barley has now been cultivated widely on different soil types including acid soils, where aluminium toxicity is a major limiting factor. Here we show that the adaptation of barley to acid soils is achieved by the modification of a single gene (HvAACT1) encoding a citrate transporter. We find that the primary function of this protein is t...