The global proliferation of counterfeit biologic medicines poses a growing threat to public health and pharmaceutical integrity. Traditional laboratory-based methods for verifying drug authenticity are often time-consuming, costly, and impractical for real-time or field-based applications. This paper explores the emerging potential of infrared (IR) and Raman spectroscopy for forensic detection and authentication of biologics. While these technologies are currently underutilised in forensic science, advancements in instrumentation and data analysis are rapidly enhancing their sensitivity, portability, and usability. Focusing on protein- and peptide-based therapeutics, the paper reviews the principles and applications of IR and Raman spectroscopy, highlighting their ability to detect structural and compositional differences between authentic and counterfeit biologic drugs. The discussion emphasises the importance of interdisciplinary collaboration between forensic and biopharmaceutical sciences. As counterfeiters become more sophisticated, the integration of non-destructive spectroscopic tools into forensic workflows offers a promising path toward the rapid and reliable screening of biologic drugs in both field and laboratory settings.
Floating offshore wind turbines (FOWTs) offer great potential for harnessing deep-sea wind energy. This study examines the effects of six-degree-of-freedom (6-DOF) platform motions on the dynamic structural responses of a FOWT blade by comparing its performance with a fixed-bottom system. Integrated aero-hydro-servo-elastic simulations for a 5-MW spar-type FOWT were conducted under various design load cases. Results indicate that the floating tower’s first-order natural frequency was about 29% higher than that of the fixed-bottom tower. Platform motions markedly influenced blade flapwise and torsional responses, with the effect intensifying under larger waves. For instance, as the significant wave height increased from 1.70 m to 9.90 m, the differences in peak response between the floating and fixed-bottom systems grew from 0.104 m to 0.363 m for blade-tip flapwise deflection, from 528.1 kN·m to 1817.4 kN·m for the root flapwise bending moment, and from 5.02 kN·m to 18.73 kN·m for the root torsional moment. In contrast, blade edgewise responses showed negligible changes, with peak deflection differences below 0.05 m. Blade loads were more sensitive to wave conditions, while platform motion magnitudes were more affected by wind. These findings offer insights into the load characteristics and structural design of FOWT blades.
Despite its tendency to produce hypotension, propofol is used widely to induce general anesthesia and to facilitate endotracheal intubation in critically ill patients. Both dose reduction and routine co-administration of vasopressors have been used to offset this unfavorable hemodynamic effect in this subset of individuals. There are potential problems associated with each of these corrective measures, however, and criticism of other intravenous hypnotics used for this purpose—particularly etomidate—may be unwarranted. Choice of the appropriate pharmacology to induce anesthesia to assist with intubation should likely be based on individual clinical assessment, together with an understanding of the drug profile and realistic adverse effects.
Selective hydrogenative depolymerization of polyesters to diols is regarded as a promising strategy for plastics upcycling. However, many catalysts documented in literature still involve harsh reaction conditions, such as high temperature and high H2 pressure. In this work, we present a PN3-ruthenium complex catalyzed polyesters upcycling into various highly value-added diols under mild reaction conditions using H2 as a hydrogen source. It is worth noting that PLA depolymerizes into 1,2-propanediol under 1 MPa hydrogen pressure at ambient temperature within 2 h; the conditions are much milder than those of previous reports. Aromatic polyester PET degradation needs harsher reaction conditions (80 °C, 4 MPa, 3 h). The different reaction conditions enable direct separation of the degradation products of PLA and PET mixture via sequential depolymerization, as well as mixing them with polyolefins (PE, PP, PS). More strikingly, this catalyst is also effective for the catalytic hydrogenation of polyesters in the presence of ethanol to afford various diols, avoiding the use of harsh reaction conditions and an expensive autoclave.
A fishway can assist fish species in overcoming barriers to migration, which depends on the eco-hydraulic characteristics of the fishway. Based on the tail fish benefiting when at the rear of a school than when at the front, and taking into account most anadromous fish species being characterized by egg-shaped morphology, the turbulent characteristics of an egg-shaped orifice fishway were experimentally studied in a fishway flume, a comparison with a rectangular orifice fishway with the same aspect ratio was made. The results showed that the maximum longitudinal velocity for the egg-shaped orifice decays faster than that for the rectangular one, the longitudinal velocity profile exhibits two peak values, while the corresponding velocity distribution for the rectangular orifice only reveals one peak, peak values of turbulence intensity on the different horizontal plane of egg-shaped orifice occur in the orifice edges, the larger turbulence intensities still exists in the central besides the edges for the rectangular orifice, Reynolds stress reaches peak value at the orifice edges, Auto-correlation coefficient of longitudinal velocity within orifice region is of small amplitude and short period relative to the outside the orifice region, microscale eddies within the orifice region were larger than those outside, mean scale of eddy is of larger variation and shorter period, and develops outside the orifice region, frequency-spectrum of velocity fluctuation exhibits dominant frequency in the low-frequency domain.
