An Air Quality Modeling Study Comparing Two Possible Sites for the New International Airport for Mexico City

Abstract

Using an air quality model, two future urban scenarios induced by the construction of the new international airport for Mexico City are compared at a regional level. The air quality model couples the meteorology model MM5 and state-of-the-art photochemistry. The air quality comparison is made using metrics for the criterion gases selected for the study. From the two urban scenarios compared, the option for Tizayuca is moderately better than the option for Texcoco, because relative reductions in O₃ and other photochemical pollutants are achieved over highly populated areas. Regardless of the site, the air quality for the central region of Mexico in the future will deteriorate. In the region of central Mexico, SO₂ and NO₂ will become important pollutants.     

Comparison of the Performance of Statistical Models in Forecasting Monthly Total Dissolved Solids in the Rio Grande1

Abudu, S., J.P. King, Z. Sheng, 2011. Comparison of the Performance of Statistical Models in Forecasting Monthly Total Dissolved Solids in the Rio Grande. Journal of the American Water Resources Association (JAWRA) 48(1): 10‐23. DOI: 10.1111/j.1752‐1688.2011.00587.x Abstract: This paper presents the application of autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA), transfer function‐noise (TFN), and artificial neural networks (ANNs) modeling approaches in forecasting monthly total dissolved solids (TDS) of water in the Rio Grande at El Paso, Texas. Predictability analysis was performed between the precipitation, temperature, streamflow rates at the site, releases from upstream reservoirs, and monthly TDS using cross‐correlation statistical tests. The chi‐square test results indicated that the average monthly temperature and precipitation did not show significant predictability on monthly TDS series. The performances of one‐ to three‐month‐ahead model forecasts for the testing period of 1984‐1994 showed that the TFN model that incorporated the streamflow rates at the site and Caballo Reservoir release improved monthly TDS forecasts slightly better than the ARIMA models. Except for one‐month‐ahead forecasts, the ANN models using the streamflow rates at the site as inputs resulted in no significant improvements over the TFN models at two‐month‐ahead and three‐month‐ahead forecasts. For three‐month‐ahead forecasts, the simple ARIMA showed similar performance compared to all other models. The results of this study suggested that simple deseasonalized ARIMA models could be used in one‐ to three‐month‐ahead TDS forecasting at the study site with a simple, explicit model structure and similar model performance as the TFN and ANN models for better water management in the Basin.     

林可霉素菌(Streptomyces lincolnensis)利用吡唑酮废水的研究

采用被吡唑酮废液驯化、分离、筛选后的林可霉素菌,并对其在摇瓶上利用吡唑酮废液中的硫酸铵发酵(7 d)生产林可霉素进行了研究。实验结果表明,废液加入培养基体积比都为1∶10,实验1中菌丝代谢和对照比正常,其中还原糖利用最快,在发酵后期为0.24 mg/L,林可霉素起步效价最低为2 100 IU/mL,与对照相比最后发酵效价降低了70 IU/mL;实验2发酵过程pH值偏低,全程为5.86～6.50,氨基氮代谢缓慢为40 mg/100 mL,最后林可霉素效价最低为4 480 IU/mL;实验3中废液在发酵进入48 h中后期的时候补入能促进菌丝体分泌,最后林可霉素为5 180 IU/mL,比对照发酵水平高出8.82%。可见实验3的实验设计有利于林可霉素菌利用吡唑酮废液生产林可霉素,为废物循环利用、变废为宝的可行性作了有意义尝试。     

Gender,age and subject matter: impact on teachers’ ecological values

By means of environmental education, teachers are supposed to intervene in pupils’ awareness and concern of environmental issues. Teachers’ environmental attitudes, however, have rarely been studied. We analysed 367 German pre- and in-service teachers’ environmental attitudes for their structure and socio-economic correlates within the frame of a European project. Thus, we retrieved for adults the two-dimensional model of ecological values (2-MEV) presented for adolescents by Bogner and Wiseman (Sci Educ Int 15(1):27–48, 2004). For the two domains, Preservation and Utilisation, the psychometric structure was confirmed and discriminative correlations with age, gender and teaching subject were unveiled. Further research is needed to deduce the implications for teaching practice.     

Persistent organic pollutants and heavy metals in adipose tissues of patients with uterine leiomyomas and the association of these pollutants with seafood diet, BMI, and age

Background, aim, and scope  

Persistent organic pollutants and heavy metals can cause diseases in women, however, the relationships of these pollutants and uterine leiomyomas (UL), which are non-cancerous tumors of the uterus, are unclear. This study focused on the quantification of organochlorine pesticides (OCPs), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs), and heavy metals in subcutaneous and visceral fat obtained from patients with UL and in subcutaneous fat of a control group of women without UL to determine if there were any correlations between concentrations of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) and heavy metals and the incidence of UL.     

A method of detecting carbonyl compounds in tree leaves in China

Background, aim, and scope  

Carbonyl compounds have been paid more and more attention because some carbonyl species have been proven to be carcinogenic or a risk for human health. Plant leaves are both an important emission source and an important sink of carbonyl compounds. But the research on carbonyl compounds from plant leaves is very scarce. In order to make an approach to the emission mechanism of plant leaves, a new method was established to extract carbonyl compounds from fresh plant leaves.     

基于空间信息技术的呼伦湖流域研究

通过对干涉雷达技术任务(SRTM)数据处理,运用土壤与水评价工具(SWAT)模型对呼伦湖整个流域的数字高程模型(DEM)进行水文特征提取,分析流域地形分布情况。呼伦湖全流域面积约为25.6万km2,蒙古国部分约为16.3万km2,约占总面积的63.7%。坡度为0～2.0°的地形主要分布在中国境内的呼伦湖南岸和东岸以及贝尔湖周边的平坦草原上,降雨主要被植被截留和土壤吸收,产汇流条件差;而呼伦湖的主要水源、产汇流条件较好的克鲁伦河和乌尔逊河,其产流区大部分位于蒙古国。2国应加强流域综合管理,合理配置水资源,以保证下游入湖的水量来防止呼伦湖的持续萎缩。     

可见光响应型CuO/BiVO4的光催化活性研究

采用浸渍法制备了CuO/BiVO4光催化剂,通过X射线衍射(XRD)、热重/差示扫描量热(TG/DSC)和傅立叶红外光谱(FTIR)对其进行了表征,并在可见光照射下考察了其光催化氧化亚甲基蓝(MB)的动力学特性。结果表明,Cu的掺杂并未改变BiVO4的晶型结构;Cu(NO3)2/BiVO4在热处理(30～300℃)过程中,NO3-已经完全分解,Cu最终以CuO的形式存在于CuO/BiVO4光催化剂体系中;掺杂不同量Cu的CuO/BiVO4中的Cu2+/Bi+(摩尔比)实测值与理论值相近,该系列光催化剂的合成过程具有较高的可信度;在可见光照射下,CuO/BiVO4光催化降解MB反应符合表观一级反应动力学特征;当Cu2+/Bi+为0.050时,反应动力学速率常数(k)达到最高值(0.4334h-1),此时的k比单体BiVO4作用下的提高了1.04倍;由于异质结的存在,CuO/BiVO4与单体BiVO4相比,电子和空穴的利用率大大增加,使得CuO/BiVO4的光催化活性较单体BiVO4有了大幅度提高。     

WRF-Chem simulation of East Asian air quality: Sensitivity to temporal and vertical emissions distributions

This study develops fine temporal (seasonal, day-of-week, diurnal) and vertical allocations of anthropogenic emissions for the TRACE-P inventory and evaluates their impacts on the East Asian air quality prediction using WRF-Chem simulations in July 2001 at 30-km grid spacing against available surface measurements from EANET and NEMCC. For NO₂ and SO₂, the diurnal and vertical redistributions of emissions play essential roles, while the day-of-week variation is less important. When all incorporated, WRF-Chem best simulates observations of surface NO₂ and SO₂ concentrations, while using the default emissions produces the worst result. The sensitivity is especially large over major cities and industrial areas, where surface NO₂ and SO₂ concentrations are reduced by respectively 3–7 and 6–12 ppbv when using the scaled emissions. The incorporation of all the three redistributions of emissions simulates surface O₃ concentrations higher by 4–8 ppbv at night and 2–4 ppbv in daytime over broad areas of northern, eastern and central China. To this sensitivity, the diurnal redistribution contributes more than the other two.