Enhancing Compressive Strength of Cement by Indigenous Individual and Co-Culture Bacteria.

Using a Taguchi experimental design, this research focuses on utilizing indigenous bacteria from the Danube River to enhance the self-healing capabilities and structural integrity of cementitious materials. and were used as individual bacterium or in co-culture, with a concentration of 8 logs CFU, while the humidity variation involved testing wet and wet-dry conditions. Additionally, artificial neural network (ANN) modeling of the compressive strength of cement samples results in improvements in compressive strength, particularly under wet-dry conditions.

Reactivity and Pozzolanic Properties of Biomass Ashes Generated by Wheat and Soybean Straw Combustion.

A sustainable use of locally available wastes from agriculture as supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs) is an alternative solution for the prevention of excessive raw material usage, reduction of CO emission and cost-effective concrete production. This paper studies the reactivity of non-traditional waste SCMs: Wheat straw ash (WSA), mixture of wheat and soybean straw ash (WSSA) and soybean straw ash (SSA), which are abundant as agricultural by-products in Serbia. The chemical evaluation using XRF technique, thermal analysis (TGA/DSC), XRD and FTIR methods were performed along with physical properties tests to investigate the feasibility of utilizing biomass ashes as cement substitutes.

Invariant NKT Cell Activation Induces Late Preterm Birth That Is Attenuated by Rosiglitazone.

Preterm birth (PTB) is the leading cause of neonatal morbidity and mortality worldwide. Although intra-amniotic infection is a recognized cause of spontaneous preterm labor, the noninfection-related etiologies are poorly understood. In this article, we demonstrated that the expansion of activated CD1d-restricted invariant NKT (iNKT) cells in the third trimester by administration of α-galactosylceramide (α-GalCer) induced late PTB and neonatal mortality.

Direct, facile synthesis of N-acyl-alpha-amino amides from alpha-keto esters and ammonia.

N-acyl-alpha-amino amides were prepared, without the necessity of chromatographic purification, in a single step by heating the corresponding alpha-keto ester in methanolic ammonia.