After the Industrial Revolution, the ever-increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration has resulted in significant problems for human beings. Nearly all countries in the world are actively taking measures to fight for carbon neutrality. In recent years, negative carbon emission technologies have attracted much attention due to their ability to reduce or recycle excess CO2 in the atmosphere. This review summarizes the state-of-the-art negative carbon emission technologies, from the artificial enhancement of natural carbon sink technology to the physical, chemical, or biological methods for carbon capture, as well as CO2 utilization and conversion. Finally, we expound on the challenges and outlook for improving negative carbon emission technology to accelerate the pace of achieving carbon neutrality. 

Fight for Carbon Neutrality with State-of-the-art Negative Carbon Emission Technologies

Improvement of bio-based polyurethane and its optimal application in controlled release fertilizer.

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Haptoglobin polymorphism, plasma haptoglobin level and ABO blood group in leprosy patients

Heroin addiction is a chronic, complex disease, often accompanied by other concomitant disorders, which may encumber effective prevention and treatment. To explore the differences in expression profiles of serum proteins in control and heroin addicts, we used two-dimensional electrophoresis coupled to MALDI-TOF/TOF, and identified 4 proteins of interest. Following validation of the increase in serum transthyretin, we assessed serum levels of thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH), triiodothyronine (T3), and thyroxine (T4), and observed a robust increase in T4 in heroin addicts compared to controls. In addition, we performed haptoglobin (Hp) phenotyping, and showed that the frequency of Hp0 (serum devoid of haptoglobin) was significantly higher in heroin addicts. Altogether, these findings indicated that: (1) thyroid hormone imbalance is present in heroin addicts; (2) anhaptoglobinemia (Hp0) might a risk factor or a deleterious effect of heroin abuse.

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Serum proteomic analysis reveals high frequency of haptoglobin deficiency and elevated thyroxine level in heroin addicts.

Enhanced weathering is a proposed carbon dioxide removal (CDR) strategy to accelerate natural carbon sequestration in soils via the amendment of silicate rocks to agricultural soils. Among the suitable silicates (such as basalt and olivine), the fast-weathering mineral wollastonite (CaSiO3) stands out. Not only does the use of wollastonite lead to rapid pedogenic carbonate formation in soils, it can be readily detected for verification of carbon sequestration, but its weathering within weeks to months influences soil chemistry and plant growth within the same crop cycle of its application. This enables a variety of short-term experimental agronomic studies to be conducted to demonstrate in an accelerated manner what could take years to be observed with more abundant but slower weathering silicates. This study presents the results of three studies that were conducted to investigate three distinct aspects of wollastonite skarn weathering in soils in the context of both agricultural and horticultural plants. The first study investigated the effect of a wide range of wollastonite skarn dosages in soil (1.5–10 wt.%) on the growth of green beans. The second study provides insights on the role of silicon (Si) release during silicate weathering on plant growth (soybeans and lettuce). The third study investigated the effect of wollastonite skarn on the growth of spring rye when added to soil alongside a nitrogen-based coated fertilizer. The results of these three studies provide further evidence that amending soil with crushed silicate rocks leads to climate-smart farming, resulting in inorganic carbon sequestration, as well as better plant growth in agricultural (soybean and spring rye) and horticultural (green bean and lettuce) crops. They also demonstrate the value of working with wollastonite skarn as a fast-weathering silicate rock to accelerate our understanding of the mineral–soil–plant–nutrient synergism of enhanced weathering.

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Mineral–Soil–Plant–Nutrient Synergisms of Enhanced Weathering for Agriculture: Short-Term Investigations Using Fast-Weathering Wollastonite Skarn

Controlled release fertilizers (CRFs) for climate-smart agriculture practices: a comprehensive review on release mechanism, materials, methods of preparation, and effect on environmental parameters

Serum haptoglobin phenotypes were studied in 80 patients with leprosy classified according to the criteria of Ridley and Jopling. The distribution of phenotypes was: 2-2, 65%; 2-1, 27.5%; 1-1, 1.25%; and 0-0, 6.25%. This distribution was not significantly different from the controls except for the phenotype 0-0 (p less than 0.02). Thus, although this genetic marker did not correlate with the occurrence of the variety of disease, it is possible that leprosy caused inhibition of haptoglobin synthesis and therefore an apparent increased frequency of the 0-0 phenotype. Evidence for such a secondary anhaptoglobinemia was available in one case.

H. J. Jariwala

Papers

Controlled release fertilizers (CRFs) for climate-smart agriculture practices: a comprehensive review on release mechanism, materials, methods of preparation, and effect on environmental parameters

Improvement of bio-based polyurethane and its optimal application in controlled release fertilizer.

Mineral–Soil–Plant–Nutrient Synergisms of Enhanced Weathering for Agriculture: Short-Term Investigations Using Fast-Weathering Wollastonite Skarn

Haptoglobin phenotypes in leprosy.