Publications by authors named "M G Rasteiro"
Article Synopsis
- The study examines the impact of microplastics (MPs) in aquatic environments, focusing on effluents from textile industries, which are significant contributors to MP pollution.
- Using various analytical techniques, researchers found that polyethylene terephthalate (PET) and polyamide were the most prevalent plastic types in the effluents, with municipal wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) surprisingly contributing more overall pollution despite better MP removal rates.
- A new bio-based flocculant made from wood wastes was developed, showing effectiveness in removing PET microplastics from wastewater, thereby addressing the issue of MP contamination from WWTP discharges.
Lignin is a complex biopolymer whose efficient extraction from biomass is crucial for various applications. Deep eutectic solvents (DES), particularly natural-origin DES (NADES), have emerged as promising systems for lignin fractionation and separation from other biomass components. While ternary DES offer enhanced fractionation performance, the role of each component in these mixtures remains unclear.
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- Cellulose and lignin from biomass can be extracted using a sustainable deep eutectic solvent (DES) made of choline chloride and levulinic acid, offering an alternative to harmful traditional methods.
- The study focused on optimizing extraction parameters (time and temperature) for maximum fractionation yield, finding significant positive effects on both lignin and cellulose extraction.
- Validation through repeatability tests showed high precision, and the DES solvent maintained effectiveness even after being reused five times, indicating a promising method for utilizing invasive species biomass.
Cellulose nanofibrils (CNFs) are particles with a high aspect ratio. Typically, chemically pre-treated CNFs (containing anionic or cationic charged groups) consist of long fibrils (up to 2 μm) with very low thickness (less than 10 nm). Derived from their high aspect ratio, CNFs form strong hydrogels with high elasticity at low concentrations.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: Electrical tomography is widely recognized for its high time resolution and low cost. However, the implementation of electrical tomographic solutions has been hindered by the high computational overhead associated, which causes delays in the analysis, and numerical instability, that results in unclear reconstructed images. Therefore, it has been mostly applied offline, for qualitative tasks and with some delay.
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