I have developed "tennis elbow" from lugging this book around the past four weeks, but it is worth the pain, the effort, and the aspirin. It is also worth the (relatively speaking) bargain price. Including appendixes, this book contains 894 pages of text. The entire panorama of the neural sciences is surveyed and examined, and it is comprehensive in its scope, from genomes to social behaviors. The editors explicitly state that the book is designed as "an introductory text for students of biology, behavior, and medicine," but it is hard to imagine any audience, interested in any fragment of neuroscience at any level of sophistication, that would not enjoy this book. The editors have done a masterful job of weaving together the biologic, the behavioral, and the clinical sciences into a single tapestry in which everyone from the molecular biologist to the practicing psychiatrist can find and appreciate his or

Principles of Neural Science

Human skin is a remarkable organ. It consists of an integrated, stretchable network of sensors that relay information about tactile and thermal stimuli to the brain, allowing us to maneuver within our environment safely and effectively. Interest in large-area networks of electronic devices inspired by human skin is motivated by the promise of creating autonomous intelligent robots and biomimetic prosthetics, among other applications. The development of electronic networks comprised of flexible, stretchable, and robust devices that are compatible with large-area implementation and integrated with multiple functionalities is a testament to the progress in developing an electronic skin (e-skin) akin to human skin. E-skins are already capable of providing augmented performance over their organic counterpart, both in superior spatial resolution and thermal sensitivity. They could be further improved through the incorporation of additional functionalities (e.g., chemical and biological sensing) and desired properties (e.g., biodegradability and self-powering). Continued rapid progress in this area is promising for the development of a fully integrated e-skin in the near future.

25th Anniversary Article: The Evolution of Electronic Skin (E-Skin): A Brief History, Design Considerations, and Recent Progress

Factors affecting the rejection of organic solutes during NF/RO treatment—a literature review

Advances in cellulose ester performance and application

https://escholarship.org/content/qt50r1b9sg/qt50r1b9sg.pdf?t=ok16ag

Engineered nanomaterials for water treatment and remediation: Costs, benefits, and applicability

Novel poly-glutamic acid functionalized microfiltration membranes for sorption of heavy metals at high capacity

Predictive reverse osmosis (RO) models have been well-developed for many systems. However, the applications to dilute organic−water systems require the modification of transport models and the understanding of solute−polymer interactions. Studies with various substituted, nonionized phenolic compounds showed that these could cause substantial membrane water flux drop, even in dilute solutions with negligible osmotic pressure. Further, the organics could significantly adsorb on the cross-linked aromatic polyamide active layer. In some cases, even concentrations as low as 0.2 mM, 2,4-dinitrophenol (solution in particle-free, double-distilled water) can cause as much as a 70% flux drop with an aromatic polyamide membrane. Two models are presented in this paper:  a modified steady-state solution diffusion model and an unsteady-state diffusion adsorption model which are able to predict flux and permeate concentrations from a single RO experiment. Further, the development of these models allows for the understa...

Separation of organic pollutants by reverse osmosis and nanofiltration membranes: Mathematical models and experimental verification

This study ascertained the technical potential of producing biofuel from a naturally occurring macroalgae. The algae examined grow in Jamaica Bay, New York City, on water containing nitrates, phosphates, and carbon dioxide that comes from the atmosphere. The process consisted of manual and mechanical harvesting, drying, grinding, and subjecting the algal matter to acid hydrolysis to extract carbohydrates to form an algal sugar solution. Fermentation of that solution to butanol was performed with butanol ultimately removed by distillation. An average of 15.2 g/L of reducing sugars was extracted in the hydrolysate showing that macroalgae (Ulva lactuca) have significant usable carbohydrates after hydrolysis. It was found necessary to remove the excess solids from the hydrolysate prior to fermentation, as the productivity fell by 75% if this was not done. With the bacterial strains (Clostridium beijerinckii and C. saccharoperbutylacetonicum) and the algal sugar solutions used, an acetone butanol ethanol (ABE) fermentation was used to make butanol. The butanol concentration in the fermentation broth reached about 4 g/L, which is close to the theoretical value for the sugar concentration obtained, and compares well (when adjusted for sugar concentration in the media) with values reported in the literature for other systems. The recovery of reducing sugars in the media during the pilot study was 0.29 g butanol/g sugar. © 2011 American Institute of Chemical Engineers Environ Prog, 2012

The production of butanol from Jamaica bay macro algae

The replacement of petrochemicals with biobased chemicals requires efficient bioprocesses, biocatalysis, and product recovery. Biocatalysis (e.g., enzyme conversion and fermentation) offers an attractive alternative to chemical processing because biocatalysts utilize renewable feedstocks under benign reaction conditions. One class of chemical products that could be produced in large volumes by biocatalysis is organic acids. However, biocatalytic reactions to produce organic acids typically result in only dilute concentrations of the product because of product inhibition and acidification that drives the reaction pH outside of the optimal range for the biocatalyst. Buffering or neutralization results in formation of the acid salt rather than the acid, which requires further processing to recover the free acid product. To address these barriers to biocatalytic organic acid production, we developed the “separative bioreactor” based on resin wafer electrodeionization, which is an electrodeionization ...

Jamie A. Hestekin

Papers

Novel poly-glutamic acid functionalized microfiltration membranes for sorption of heavy metals at high capacity

Separation of organic pollutants by reverse osmosis and nanofiltration membranes: Mathematical models and experimental verification

The production of butanol from Jamaica bay macro algae

The Separative Bioreactor: A Continuous Separation Process for the Simultaneous Production and Direct Capture of Organic Acids

Potential of electrodialytic techniques in brackish desalination and recovery of industrial process water for reuse