Found 565 results
Open Access
Article
23 March 2026Preparation of MgAl2O4 Porous Ceramics for High-Temperature Flue Gas Filtration Application by In-Situ Decomposition Method
Porous ceramic filters exhibit excellent prospects for application in the field of high-temperature flue gas filtration. In this study, the MgAl2O4 porous ceramics were prepared using α-Al2O3, MgO, and EDTA-MgNa2 as raw materials by the in-situ decomposition method. The effect of the introduction of EDTA-MgNa2 on phase composition and microstructure, as well as the correlation between the content of EDTA-MgNa2 and ceramic properties, was investigated using XRD, SEM, and EDS. The results revealed that the introduction of EDTA-MgNa2 formed pores, thereby improving gas permeability. Additionally, the addition of EDTA-MgNa2 was beneficial for the formation of a transitional liquid and promoted sintering, thereby slowing the decrease in compressive strength. The optimal specimen is the ceramic with 10 wt% EDTA-MgNa2, which exhibits a high porosity of 56.28%, a compressive strength of 10.93 MPa, and a high gas permeability coefficient (8.84 × 10−9 m2).
Open Access
Review
23 March 2026Roles of Astrocytes in Radiation-Induced Brain Injury: Pathophysiological Mechanisms and Therapeutic Strategies
Radiation-induced brain injury (RIBI), a common adverse effect of cranial radiotherapy for head malignancies, causes severe complications, including blood-brain barrier (BBB) disruption, neuroinflammation, cognitive decline, and radiation necrosis (RN) that impair patients’ quality of life. The pathophysiology of RIBI involves intricate crosstalk between various central nervous system (CNS) cell types, with astrocytes, the principal CNS glial cells, serving as key mediators. Under physiological conditions, they sustain brain homeostasis, but their transition to reactive phenotypes and subsequent dysfunction propel RIBI development. This review summarizes recent advances in astrocytes’ pathophysiological roles in RIBI, focusing on mechanisms like reactive astrocyte polarization, neuroinflammation, BBB impairment, radiation-induced senescence, astrocyte-mediated RN progression, and pathological crosstalk with other CNS cells. It also outlines astrocyte-targeted therapeutic strategies with preclinical efficacy, including anti-inflammatory therapies, anti-vascular endothelial growth factor A (VEGFA) interventions, TSPO ligands, RAS blockers, apolipoprotein E (ApoE) regulation, Δ133p53, and microRNAs (miRNAs), which alleviate RIBI by targeting these pathological processes. A comprehensive understanding of astrocyte-mediated mechanisms and preclinical evidence will lay the foundation for developing targeted, low-toxicity therapies to mitigate RIBI in cranial radiotherapy patients.
Open Access
Article
23 March 2026Integrating Copernicus Earth Observation and Artificial Intelligence for Habitat Suitability Modeling of Pinctada radiata in Semi-Enclosed Coastal Watersheds of Central Greece
Semi-enclosed coastal systems are highly dynamic environments where benthic organisms are exposed to strong hydrographic gradients and increasing anthropogenic pressures. This study assessed the habitat suitability of the pearl oyster Pinctada radiata in two contrasting Mediterranean gulfs of Central Greece, the Maliakos and the South Evoikos, by integrating Copernicus Earth Observation (EO) products with an Artificial Intelligence (AI) modeling framework. Environmental variables, including sea surface temperature, salinity, chlorophyll-a concentration, current velocity, and dissolved oxygen, were derived from satellite and marine datasets and used to train a multi-algorithm ensemble combining Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt), Extreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), and a Convolutional Neural Network (CNN). The ensemble model showed strong predictive skill (AUC = 0.94; TSS = 0.80) and identified temperature, dissolved oxygen, and substrate type as the main drivers of habitat suitability. Spatial projections indicated that roughly two-thirds of the study area currently supports favorable conditions for P. radiata, particularly in shallow, low-energy, mesotrophic zones. Under a simulated +2 °C warming scenario, highly suitable habitats declined by about 20%, highlighting the species’ sensitivity to future thermal stress and subsequent oxygen depletion, demonstrating the value of EO-driven AI approaches for anticipating ecological change in vulnerable coastal systems.
Open Access
Perspective
20 March 2026Water Does Not Negotiate: Hydrologic Legitimacy and the Institutional Future of Rural and Regional Development
Rural and regional development is often framed as an economic or service-delivery challenge, whereas water is treated as infrastructure or compliance. That separation is analytically convenient but operationally false. Hydrologic regime reality and water quality dynamics are non-negotiable physical constraints that quietly determine what rural communities can credibly promise, finance, permit, and defend over time. At the same time, many rural water systems and watershed programs operate within institutional arrangements that were not designed for slow hydrologic lags, cross-boundary pollutant legacies, or the legitimacy demands created by uneven exposure to risk. This perspective, therefore, suggests that rural development should be recentered on water governance: the coupled system of hydrologic processes, water-quality legacies, and organizational capabilities that together produce reliability, safety, and trust. Recent primary research is synthesized showing that (1) legacy nutrients and ecosystem memory create multi-decade time lags that can invalidate short political or funding cycles, (2) rural and small system compliance and exposure burdens remain structurally unequal, and (3) adaptive governance capacity depends on institutional fit, partnerships, and policy and planning choices that are themselves socially patterned. A practical agenda for scholars and practitioners is proposed: build hydrologic legitimacy by aligning project claims with hydrologic time, making governance fit explicit across scales, and treating organizational change capacity as core water and rural development infrastructure. The resulting framework provides decision-makers with operational guidance for aligning development claims, governance structures, and investments with hydrologic constraints that ultimately determine long-term feasibility and trust. Rather than presenting new empirical results, this Perspective synthesizes evidence from hydrology, water quality, governance, and organizational change to conceptually reframe rural and regional development around hydrologic legitimacy as a governing constraint.
Open Access
Article
19 March 2026Intelligent Real-Time Kanban Automation Using Ultra-Wideband Positioning: Methodologies and Performance Evaluation
Traditional electronic Kanban (eKanban) systems depend on manual scans and offer only discrete material visibility, limiting responsiveness and automation in lean manufacturing environments. These operational bottlenecks are magnified in high-mix contexts, where delayed replenishment signals degrade flow stability, increase work-in-progress, and hinder sustainable material handling. Furthermore, vendor-specific systems lack interoperability for scalable automation, constraining the development of intelligent manufacturing solutions. This work investigates whether zone-based replenishment automation can be enabled through real-time locating systems (RTLS) using open interoperability standards, addressing a gap in empirical validation of such approaches. A middleware architecture was developed that integrates ultra-wideband (UWB) positioning, an Omlox-compliant location middleware (DeepHub), and a cloud-based eKanban system to replace manual triggers with geofence-driven order creation. The novelty of this study lies in demonstrating a fully automated Kanban signaling loop built on the open Omlox standard, providing vendor-independent RTLS interoperability and eliminating human intervention in replenishment signaling. This contributes new knowledge on how continuous location data can be converted into actionable replenishment events in a standards-based, modular manner, enabling more intelligent and autonomous material-flow control. A controlled proof-of-concept experiment simulating shop-floor conditions showed that the system achieved a 100% detection success rate, zero duplicate orders, and an average trigger-to-action latency of 2.7 s, while automatically recovering from authentication and WebSocket failures. These results provide the first empirical evidence that Omlox-compliant RTLS middleware can reliably support zone-based eKanban automation. The findings have direct implications for intelligent and sustainable manufacturing by demonstrating a scalable pathway toward interoperable, real-time material-flow systems that reduce manual intervention, avoid unnecessary handling, and lower work-in-progress. More broadly, the work addresses the current lack of empirical validation of open-standard RTLS integration within lean and sustainable production environments.
Open Access
Review
19 March 2026Contemporary Review on Multi-Modality Imaging Evaluation and Management of Functional Mitral Regurgitation
Functional mitral regurgitation (FMR) is a prevalent valvular disorder driven by adverse remodeling of the left ventricle and/or left atrium. This review synthesizes the contemporary evidence on multimodality imaging and its role in mechanism-specific evaluation and management of FMR, with particular emphasis on distinguishing ventricular FMR (VFMR) from atrial FMR (AFMR). FMR is mechanistically heterogeneous, requiring precise phenotyping to guide therapy. A mechanism-based framework differentiating VFMR, driven by left ventricular dilation and leaflet tethering, from AFMR, driven by left atrial and annular enlargement with preserved ventricular function, is central to contemporary management. Echocardiography remains the cornerstone for real-time assessment of MR severity, hemodynamics, and valve–ventricle interactions. Cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) provides the gold standard for volumetric quantification and myocardial tissue characterization, enabling improved risk stratification by assessing ventricular remodeling and fibrosis. Computed tomography (CT) offers high-resolution anatomic phenotyping and is essential for procedural planning, particularly for transcatheter edge-to-edge repair (TEER) and transcatheter mitral valve replacement (TMVR). Integration of multimodality imaging supports individualized selection between guideline-directed medical therapy alone, TEER, surgical intervention, or TMVR, based on the dominant mechanism and myocardial substrate. The discordant outcomes of landmark trials such as MITRA-FR and COAPT have underscored the importance of precision in patient selection, highlighting the controversial but clinically relevant proportionate/disproportionate FMR framework and the extent of myocardial fibrosis as key modifiers of treatment response. Emerging advances in advanced imaging and artificial intelligence hold promise for automated phenotyping, improved reproducibility, and earlier identification of patients most likely to benefit from intervention, ultimately enabling a more personalized, mechanism-driven approach to improving outcomes in FMR.
Open Access
Article
18 March 2026Living as Nature: Māori Political Ecology and Bruno Latour’s Challenge to Western Modernity
This article examines the emancipatory potential of the rights of nature in Aotearoa New Zealand through Bruno Latour’s concept of political ecology. We argue that the legal recognition of entities such as Te Urewera Forest and the Whanganui River as legal persons constitutes a paradigmatic experiment in reconfiguring the modern division between nature and politics. Drawing on Latour’s critique of Western modernity and his notion of hybrids and actants, we show how Māori struggles for land, mana, and “geographical identity” generate a political collective in which decolonial and ecological motives are inseparably intertwined. Rights of nature function here not merely as environmental protection instruments, but also as devices for redistributing power and legally encoding Māori concepts such as kaitiakitanga, whakapapa, and ‘listening to Papatūānuku’. In this sense, ecological and decolonial objectives converge rather than compete. We then contrast these developments with global biodiversity governance, focusing on Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services and its Life Framework of Values. While Life framework of values (IPBES) has significantly broadened its conceptual framework—particularly through the recognition of the relational and cultural values of nature—the challenge lies in translating this expanded recognition into governance practice. Policy and decision-making processes still often tend to privilege measurable and instrumental, and benefit-oriented valuation frameworks, which can make the integration of relational values difficult. The New Zealand cases thus illuminate both the radical promise and the structural limits of institutionalizing Latourian political ecology: they realize a non-modern governance of human and non-human actors domestically, while exposing the continued dominance of capitalist modernity at the global level.
Open Access
Article
16 March 2026Assessment of Genetic Diversity and Interspecific Relationships of the Genus Viburnum Inferred from Start Codon Targeted (SCoT) Polymorphism Markers
The genus Viburnum (Adoxaceae) comprises deciduous broad-leaved shrubs with a thicket-like growth habit, and globally about 150–200 species are recognized. In Korea, several native Viburnum taxa have recently been listed as threatened, emphasizing the need for robust genetic information to support conservation and management. This study aimed to evaluate genetic diversity and interspecific relationships among 33 Viburnum taxa and to establish a practical framework for their identification and management using start codon targeted (SCoT) markers. SCoT markers were chosen because they are easier to apply than simple sequence repeat (SSR) and generally provide richer nuclear variation than chloroplast DNA (cpDNA), offering a simple yet informative tool for distinguishing closely related members of this shrub genus. Seventeen SCoT primers produced 489 polymorphic bands, revealing substantial nuclear variation among the 33 Viburnum taxa. An unweighted pair-group method with arithmetic mean (UPGMA), we grouped the 33 accessions into four major genetic clusters, and this clustering pattern was in good agreement with the structure inferred from principal component analysis. These clusters highlighted the genetic isolation of the V. plicatum group and the close affinity of the V. carlesii complex, while also indicating complex relationships among East Asian species. In contrast, V. plicatum formed Cluster IV, highlighting the taxonomic positions of these lineages and their potential priority for conservation and breeding. Overall, the results demonstrate that SCoT markers provide an efficient, operationally simple system for discriminating between closely related accessions and major genetic lineages within Viburnum. The SCoT-based approach developed here provides baseline information for species and cultivar identification. It also supports germplasm conservation and the selection of genetically divergent parents for future breeding programs.
Open Access
Perspective
16 March 2026Reviving Philosophical Anthropology for the Age of Extinction
This article argues that the discipline of Philosophical Anthropology is directly relevant for comprehending the present human condition, especially regarding our collective ecological predicament and the consequences of climate change. By centralizing relations, focusing on lived experience at various levels, and adopting an interdisciplinary approach, Philosophical Anthropology provides powerful conceptual instruments for making sense of human–biosphere relations. Its focus on explaining the human condition in an antireductionist fashion, emphasizing biological and chemical processes and multiple lifeforms, is a valuable approach. These approaches are critically examined with refers to the works of Scheler, Gehlen, and Plessner, combined with a discussion of the concept of responsivity. This theoretical foundation resonates with current trends in anthropology, environmental philosophy, 4E cognition, and ecocriticism, allowing for greater appreciation of the embeddedness of organisms and the agency of non-human actors, as well as of emotional responses such as eco-anxiety and solastalgia. By integrating results from philosophy, anthropology, the exact sciences, and life sciences, a reinvigorated PA could well provide the conceptual and methodological foundation for a comprehensive theory of the Age of Extinction.
Open Access
Article
16 March 2026Domain-Specific Cloud Business Operating System for New Power Systems: Concept, Key Technologies and Initial Applications
The deep digitization of power system business faces three major challenges: computational resources are prone to crashes, business response is slow, and platform maintenance is unsustainable. To address these issues, this paper proposes a domain-specific cloud Business Operating System (BOS) for new power systems. BOS establishes a unified management paradigm for four core digital objects—Containers, Tasks, Programs, and Data—through their standardized definition and indexed organization. Building upon this foundation, it implements three dedicated plugins to enable synergistic task-container co-scheduling, plug-and-play program integration, and optimized data access. This paper elaborates on BOS’s architecture and its rationale as an operating system, detailing the key technologies for object management. Case studies on a real-world regional power grid demonstrate that BOS effectively ensures the efficient execution of large-scale computational tasks, supports the agile integration of domain-specific models and algorithms, achieves seamless and efficient data connectivity across business chains, thereby providing a robust foundation for next-generation power system digitization.
