Publications by authors named "Kathryn Ralphs"

As a globally abundant source of biomass, lignocellulosic biomass has been the centre of attention as a potential resource for green energy generation and value-added chemical production. A key component of lignocellulosic biomass, lignin, which is comprised of aromatic monomers, is a potential feedstock for value added chemical production. The cleavage processes of the linkages between monomers to obtain high value products, however, requires significant investigation as it is a complex, non-facile process.

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Dietary patterns provide a comprehensive assessment of food consumption, including essential nutrients and potential exposure to environmental contaminants. While pro-vegetarian (PVG) dietary patterns have shown health benefits in adults, their effects on children are less well studied. This study aims to explore the association between children's adherence to the most common PVG dietary patterns and their exposure to metals, assessed through urine concentration.

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Unlabelled: In Bangladesh most agronomic biomass (straw, husk, dried dung) is burnt for domestic cooking use. Consequently, the soil is continuously stripped of mineral nutrients and carbon (C) substrate. Here we investigate if recycling of household ash (ash) as fertilizer can sustainably improve soil fertility as well as minimise accumulation of toxic elements (As, Cd) in rice grain.

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The application of photocatalysis for the disinfection of water has been extensively reported over the past 30 years. Titanium dioxide (TiO) has been the most widely and successfully used photocatalyst to date; however, it is not without its limitations. Frequently observed long lag times, sometimes up to 60 min, before bacterial inactivation begins and the presence of residual microorganisms, for example, up to 10 colony forming units, remaining after treatment are ongoing challenges with this particular photocatalyst.

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This study reports the behaviour of SCILL based catalysts in the oxidative S-S coupling of aliphatic and aromatic thiols, namely 1-butanethiol and thiophenol, to dibutyl disulfide and diphenyl disulfide. A range of ionic liquids (1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide, 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide, 1-butyl-1-methylpyrrolidinium bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide) and metal supported catalysts (5% Pt/SiO; 5% Ru/SiO; 5% Ru/C; 5% Pt/OMS-2) were used to prepare the SCILL catalysts and all were found to be active for the reaction following the trend 5% Pt-OMS-2 > 5% Pt/SiO > 5% Ru/C > 5% Ru/SiO. The presence of SCILL catalysts afforded high selectivity to the disulfide, and the activity of the SCILL catalyst was dependent on the ionic liquid used.

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Mechanochemical synthesis has the potential to provide more sustainable preparative routes to catalysts than the current multistep solvent-based routes. In this review, the mechanochemical synthesis of catalysts is discussed, with emphasis placed on catalysts for environmental, energy and chemical synthesis applications. This includes the formation of mixed-metal oxides as well as the process of dispersing metals onto solid supports.

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