辽宁省危险废弃物排放现状及防治对策

论述危险废弃物的危害性，分析全省目前危险废弃物处置及管理方面存在的问题，提出对策与建议。     

Characterization of organic chemical contaminants in sediments from Jobos Bay, Puerto Rico

Jobos Bay, located on the southeastern coast of Puerto Rico, contains a variety of habitats including mangroves, seagrass meadows, and coral reefs. The watershed surrounding the bay includes a number of towns, agricultural areas, and the Jobos Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR). Jobos Bay and the surrounding watershed are part of a Conservation Effects Assessment Project (CEAP), involving the Jobos Bay NERR, the US Department of Agriculture, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to assess the benefits of agricultural best management practices (BMPs) on the terrestrial and marine environments. As part of the Jobos Bay CEAP, NOAA collected sediment samples in May 2008 to characterize over 130 organic chemical contaminants. This paper presents the results of the organic contaminant analysis. The organic contaminants detected in the sediments included polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polychlorinated biphenyls, and the pesticide DDT. PAHs at one site in the inner bay near a boat yard were significantly elevated; however, all organic contaminant classes measured were below NOAA sediment quality guidelines that would have indicated that impacts were likely. The results of this work provide an important baseline assessment of the marine environment that will assist in understanding the benefits of implementing BMPs on water quality in Jobos Bay.     

Commuting partners, dual residences and the meaning of home

The experience of home is one of the most basic of daily-life experiences. Traditionally, the home is grounded in a specific place; in commuter partnerships, however, for part of the time one partner lives near the workplace and away from the family residence. This paper provides insight into the sense of home that relates to the dual-residence situation of a commuter partnership. The meaning of the residence near the workplace is analysed through three dimensions: material, activity patterns, and social. We further classified each dimension in a continuum of meanings of space, place or home. Empirical evidence comes from in-depth interviews with 30 commuter couples in the Netherlands. The results show that the material dimension is most often used to create a sense of home. The activity patterns are primarily focused on the job. The social dimension is the most difficult way of experiencing a home because there is yet a strong relationship between being with one's family and experiencing a sense of home. As a result, many feel as living two separated lives: a work life and a private life. Only a small minority experiences the commuter dwelling as a home away from home in all its three dimensions.     

A method for assessing health and safety management systems from the resilience engineering perspective

This article introduces a method for assessing health and safety management systems (MAHS) that has two innovative characteristics: (a) it brings together the three main auditing approaches to health and safety (HS) – the structural approach (which assesses the system prescribed), the operational approach (which assesses what is really happening on the shop-floor) and the performance approach (which assesses the results of performance indicators); (b) it emphasizes the resilience engineering perspective on HS, which takes into consideration four major principles (flexibility, learning, awareness, and top management commitment). Such principles underlie seven major assessment criteria, which in turn are divided into items (e.g. hazard identification from a resilience perspective is an item that belongs to the criteria of production processes). The items are sub-divided into statements, which are the requirements that should be assessed based on interviews, analysis of documents and direct observations. Within the 112 requirements proposed, 38 of them have clear links with at least one out of the four resilience engineering principles adopted. The remaining requirements are based on traditional assumptions underlying the so-called best practices of HS management. The results of the assessment for each item are expressed by a score on a scale of compliance with the established requirements, ranging from 0% to 100%. The specific score within that scale is obtained from tables used to assess applications for the Brazilian national quality award. The MAHS was tested in a case study that was carried out in a factory that manufactures automobile exhaust systems, located in Brazil.     

A novel role for proline in plant floral nectars

Plants offer metabolically rich floral nectar to attract visiting pollinators. The composition of nectar includes not only sugars, but also amino acids. We have examined the amino acid content of the nectar of ornamental tobacco and found that it is extremely rich (2 mM) in proline. Because insect pollinators preferentially utilize proline during the initial phases of insect flight and can reportedly taste proline, we determined whether honeybees showed a preference for synthetic nectars rich in proline. We therefore established an insect preference test and found that honeybees indeed prefer nectars rich in the amino acid proline. To determine whether this was a general phenomenon, we also examined the nectars of two insect-pollinated wild perennial species of soybean. These species also showed high levels of proline in their nectars demonstrating that plants often produce proline-rich floral nectar. Because insects such as honeybees prefer proline-rich nectars, we hypothesize that some plants offer proline-rich nectars as a mechanism to attract visiting pollinators.     

The theoretical value of encounters with parasitized hosts for parasitoids

A female parasitoid searching for hosts in a patch experiences a diminishing encounter rate with unparasitized and thus suitable hosts. To use the available time most efficiently, it constantly has to decide whether to stay in the patch and continue to search for hosts or to search for and travel to another patch in the habitat. Several informational cues can be used to optimize the searching success. Theoretically, encounters with unparasitized hosts should lead to a prolonged search in a given patch if hosts are distributed contagiously. The results of empirical studies strongly support this hypothesis. However, it has, to date, not been investigated theoretically whether encounters with already parasitized hosts (which usually entail time costs) provide a parasitoid with valuable information for the optimization of its search in depletable patches, although the empirical studies concerning this question so far have produced ambiguous results. Building on recent advances in Bayesian foraging strategies, we approached this problem by modeling a priori searching strategies (which differ in the amount of information considered) and then testing them in computer simulations. By comparing the strategies, we were able to determine whether and how encounters with already parasitized hosts can yield information that can be used to enhance a parasitoid’s searching success.

Immersed solid phase microextraction to measure chemical activity of lipophilic organic contaminants in fatty tissue samples

It is known that solid phase microextraction (SPME) fibers can be equilibrated directly within environmental matrices such as water, sediment and soil slurries. Here it is shown that this method can also be applied to biological tissue. SPME extraction of biological matrices reportedly causes lipophilic fouling of the fiber. However, we found no significant measurement bias when combining equilibrium sampling with fiber surface cleaning. The uptake of lipophilic organic pollutants from the tissue and into the SPME fiber coating was characterized by fast equilibrium partitioning without sample depletion and without impacting the sorptive properties of the fiber. The precision of the method when applied to hexachlorobenzene and several PCB congeners in harbor porpoise blubber was 15%, which includes the variation between SPME samplings, manual injections and the instrumental analysis. A good correlation (r(2)=0.95) was obtained between SPME measurements of PCB 153 in blubber and concentrations obtained via a traditional analytical approach. These results indicate that SPME is a promising technique for measuring chemical activity in biological tissue, which would make it a useful tool for studying chemical distribution in organisms as well as biodilution and biomagnification phenomena.     

Unilateral Clean Development Mechanism – An approach for a least developed country?: The case of Yemen

Decision parameters prevailing in the market lead to a slim expression of interest of foreign investors for Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects in a bi- or multilateral design in Yemen. The Designated National Authority Secretariat in Yemen experiences the preference of Annex I entities of merely buying Certified Emission Reductions rather than investing in projects. Yemen's ability, like many least developed countries, to carry out unilateral CDM projects is moderate. Domestic project developers perceive difficulties in procuring underlying finance as key barrier in materializing CDM project activities in a unilateral design. The country remains trapped in a “catch 22 situation”. International assistance through low interest loans and capacity building for domestic financial institutions tailored to CDM project activities may trigger the market. Aggravation can be assisted by amending the policies of Annex I countries, in consequence to allocate a substantial share of their procurement activities to Certified Emission Reductions from least developed countries. Acquisition programmes may give preference to projects from host countries not traditionally represented in the pool of attractive CDM destinations.     

All-in-one whole exome sequencing strategy with simultaneous copy number variant,single nucleotide variant and absence-of-heterozygosity analysis in fetuses with structural ultrasound anomalies: A 1-year experience

Objective

We performed a 1-year evaluation of a novel strategy of simultaneously analyzing single nucleotide variants (SNVs), copy number variants (CNVs) and copy-number-neutral Absence-of-Heterozygosity from Whole Exome Sequencing (WES) data for prenatal diagnosis of fetuses with ultrasound (US) anomalies and a non-causative QF-PCR result.

Methods

After invasive diagnostics, whole exome parent-offspring trio-sequencing with exome-wide CNV analysis was performed in pregnancies with fetal US anomalies and a non-causative QF-PCR result (WES-CNV). On request, additional SNV-analysis, restricted to (the) requested gene panel(s) only (with the option of whole exome SNV-analysis afterward) was performed simultaneously (WES-CNV/SNV) or as rapid SNV-re-analysis, following a normal CNV analysis.

Results

In total, 415 prenatal samples were included. Following a non-causative QF-PCR result, WES-CNV analysis was initially requested for 74.3% of the chorionic villus (CV) samples and 45% of the amniotic fluid (AF) samples. In case WES-CNV analysis did not reveal a causative aberration, SNV-re-analysis was requested in 41.7% of the CV samples and 17.5% of the AF samples. All initial analyses could be finished within 2 weeks after sampling. For SNV-re-analysis during pregnancy, turn-around-times (TATs) varied between one and 8 days.

Conclusion

We show a highly efficient all-in-one WES-based strategy, with short TATs, and the option of rapid SNV-re-analysis after a normal CNV result.     

Integrated approach for the quality assessment of freshwater resources in a vineyard area (South Portugal)

An integrated chemical and biological approach for the quality assessment of freshwater resources in a vineyard area of the ??Alentejo?? region (South Portugal) is presented. This includes analysis to 11 pesticide compounds and whole toxicity testing on algae and crustaceans. Simazine, terbuthylazine, terbutryn, desethylatrazine and chlorpyrifos were the most frequently detected pesticides in water collected from wells and drainage channels. Mixtures of up to three compounds in different qualitative combinations were also found. The quality standards for individual pesticides (0.1 ??g L^???1) and pesticides-total (0.5 ??g L^???1) were exceeded in some samples. However, their maximum concentrations were lower than the WHO guidelines, the USEPA health advisory values and the environmental quality standards for priority substances applicable to surface water. In five samples, the herbicides terbuthylazine and terbutryn and the insecticide chlorpyrifos did not pass the toxicity exposure ratio (TER) trigger values specified for aquatic organisms (algae, Daphnia and fish). Maximum toxic effects on Daphnia magna (100%) and Pseudokirchneriella subcapitata (82.56%) were determined in groundwater samples, while in surface water, no toxicity was observed. Concerning effects on Heterocypris incongruens in sediment samples collected at the drainage channels, mortality and growth inhibition values were below 38%. Pro-active management of the use of pesticides is recommended for implementing at the farm and catchment level to reduce inputs into ground- and surface water.