Pancreatic and sacral agenesis in association with maternal diabetes mellitus: Case report

Sacral agenesis was diagnosed sonographically in the fetus of a diabetic mother and pancreatic agenesis was found additionally at autopsy.     

Monitoring air,soil, stream and fish for aerial drift of permethrin

Permethrin drift from two aerial applications at each of two sites in a potato growing area in Ontario were measured to a maximum distance of 61 m outside the treatment area. Droplet drift did not enter the adjacent surface water streams at either study site, since there was little or no wind on the four occasions. The concentration of the insecticide in soil as a result of drifting off site was significantly lower than the amount deposited on the treatment area. The spray drifting off-target was generally made up of droplets <100 m. Permethrin residues were detected in the water and sediment samples collected after treatment along the Bailey Creek and Beeton Creek; however, these levels did not cause lethal or sublethal effects to aquatic invertebrates and fish species. Based on the conditions and results of this study, it is concluded that a buffer zone of 65 m around sensitive and productive bodies of water would be effective and practical.     

Electricity from fossil fuels without CO2 emissions: assessing the costs of carbon dioxide capture and sequestration in U.S. electricity markets.

The decoupling of fossil-fueled electricity production from atmospheric CO2 emissions via CO2 capture and sequestration (CCS) is increasingly regarded as an important means of mitigating climate change at a reasonable cost. Engineering analyses of CO2 mitigation typically compare the cost of electricity for a base generation technology to that for a similar plant with CO2 capture and then compute the carbon emissions mitigated per unit of cost. It can be hard to interpret mitigation cost estimates from this plant-level approach when a consistent base technology cannot be identified. In addition, neither engineering analyses nor general equilibrium models can capture the economics of plant dispatch. A realistic assessment of the costs of carbon sequestration as an emissions abatement strategy in the electric sector therefore requires a systems-level analysis. We discuss various frameworks for computing mitigation costs and introduce a simplified model of electric sector planning. Results from a "bottom-up" engineering-economic analysis for a representative U.S. North American Electric Reliability Council (NERC) region illustrate how the penetration of CCS technologies and the dispatch of generating units vary with the price of carbon emissions and thereby determine the relationship between mitigation cost and emissions reduction.     

Estimation of aqueous solubility of organic compounds by using the general solubility equation

The general solubility equation (GSE) proposed by Jain and Yalkowsky was used to estimate aqueous solubility of 1026 non-electrolytes. The only parameters used in the GSE are melting points (MP) and octanol-water partition coefficients (Kow). No fitted parameters and no training set are employed in the GSE. The experimental solubility values were taken from the AQUASOL dATAbASE. The average absolute error and the root-mean-square error in the solubility estimates are 0.38 and 0.53 log units, respectively. Thus, with an observed MP and calculated Kow; the users can obtain a reasonable estimation of the aqueous solubility of any organic non-electrolyte.     

Forecasting peak daily ozone levels--I. A regression with time series errors model having a principal component trigger to fit 1991 ozone levels

This research was motivated by the need to warn the population of Milwaukee, WI, on high-ozone days. A statistical model for the peak daily 1-hr ozone level is proposed. A Regression with Time Series Errors (RTSE) model, which includes a principal component (PC) trigger, is the basis for forecasting the peak daily 1-hr ozone level. The RTSE model, with a PC trigger, is first employed to estimate daily peak ozone measured at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee-North (UWM-N), during the 1991 ozone season. The RTSE model uses peak daily temperature, morning vector average wind direction, and the PC trigger as predictor variables. The PC trigger was designed to summarize atmospheric circumstances when peak ozone was greater than 100 parts per billion (ppb). It is verified that the RTSE model, with a PC trigger, significantly improves the prediction of peak daily ozone, particularly peak ozone greater than 100 ppb. In comparison with the RTSE model without the PC trigger, the RTSE model with a PC trigger raised the R2 from 0.680 to 0.809. It is suggested that the RTSE model, with the PC trigger, is an adequate statistical model that has the potential for real-time ozone forecasting.     

Determination of the source areas contributing to regionally high warm season PM2.5 in eastern North America

An ensemble-trajectory analysis technique known as Quantitative Transport Bias Analysis was applied to determine which geographic areas systematically contributed to above- and below-average fine particle mass (PM2.5) over eastern North America. Six-hour average measurements from 12 rural or suburban locations in eastern North America collected using a tapered element oscillating microbalance were individually associated with corresponding 3-day back-trajectories for the warm seasons (May-September) of 2000 and 2001. Much of the populated areas of northeastern North America were implicated in the build-up of PM2.5 to above-average concentrations. The finer structure of the Quantitative Transport Bias Analysis pattern indicated that transport from the Ohio River Valley, particularly the eastern portion of this area, was most often associated with the highest PM2.5 concentrations. In addition, air masses originating over a relatively large area from southeast Ohio to the western part of Virginia and the western Kentucky to central Tennessee area tended to result in relatively high PM2.5 concentrations over northeastern North America. These observation-based findings were consistent with the spatial distribution of the main sulfur dioxide emissions sources and the major oxides of nitrogen point sources.     

Preliminary on-road measurement of the effect of oxygenated fuel on CO emissions near Las Vegas, Nevada

A preliminary measurement of an oxygenated fuel effect for in-use vehicles travelling at freeway speed was conducted near Las Vegas, NV, in January 1991 and May 1992. The experimental design was based on two principal factors: (1) the large volume of traffic that visits Las Vegas from Southern California on three-day holiday weekends and (2) the fact that, at the time of the study, the Las Vegas area used oxygenated fuels in the winter and Southern California did not. Measurements were conducted at carefully selected sites 20 km southwest of Las Vegas near Sloan, NV, and were accomplished with the Fuel Efficiency Automoblie Test (FEAT) remote sensor developed at the University of Denver. The January 1991 measurements were made during the Las Vegas oxyfuel season, while the May 1992 control measurements were made outside the oxyfuel season. Over 24,500 individual CO concentrations were measured; registration data from over 5,500 of these vehicles were obtained from the license plate numbers. After corrections for differences in velocity and mean age, the Las Vegas outbound (oxyfuel) CO emissions on Monday morning of the January holiday weekend showed a difference of -18% +/- 11% compared to the inbound (non-oxyfuel) CO emissions on Friday evening preceding the holiday weekend.