A method for assessing environmental contamination in harbour sediments and designing the forthcoming monitoring activities in enlarged coastal ecosystems is proposed herein. The method is based on coupling principal component analysis of previous sampling campaigns with a discrete optimisation of a value for money function. The objective function represents the utility derived for every sum of money spent in sampling and chemical analysis. The method was then used to assess actual contamination and found to be well suited for reducing the number of chemicals to be searched during extended monitoring activities and identifying the possible sources of contamination. Data collected in Savona Harbour (Porto Vado), Italy, where construction of a new terminal construction is planned, were used to illustrate the procedure. 23 chemicals were searched for within a total of 213 samples in 68 sampling points during three monitoring campaigns. These data were used to test the procedure. Subsequently, 28 chemicals were searched for within 14 samples in 10 sampling points and collected data were used to evaluate the experimental error and to validate the proposed procedure.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2014.12.028 | DOI Listing |
Biomed Res Int
January 2025
Center for Personalized Nanomedicine, Australian Institute for Bioengineering & Nanotechnology (AIBN), The University of Queensland, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
Environmental pollution has been a significant concern for the last few years. The leather industry significantly contributes to the economy but is one of Bangladesh's most prominent polluting industries. It is also responsible for several severe diseases such as cancer, lung diseases, and heart diseases of leather workers because they use bleaching agents and chemicals, and these have numerous adverse effects on human health.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPrev Med Rep
January 2025
One Health Research Group, Faculty of Medicine, Universidad de las Américas, Quito, Ecuador.
Background: Electronic cigarettes, introduced as a safer tobacco alternative, have unintentionally exposed millions of youths to nicotine and harmful chemicals. Adolescence, a key period for forming lifelong habits, has seen rising e-cigarette use, particularly in developing regions like Latin America, warranting thorough investigation.
Objective: To describe the prevalence and factors associated with e-cigarette use among adolescents in Latin America.
Digit Discov
January 2025
School of Natural and Environmental Sciences, Newcastle University Newcastle Upon Tyne NE1 7RU UK
FEgrow is an open-source software package for building congeneric series of compounds in protein binding pockets. For a given ligand core and receptor structure, it employs hybrid machine learning/molecular mechanics potential energy functions to optimise the bioactive conformers of supplied linkers and functional groups. Here, we introduce significant new functionality to automate, parallelise and accelerate the building and scoring of compound suggestions, such that it can be used for automated design.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFExpert Opin Ther Pat
January 2025
Department of Pharmaceutical and Biomedical Sciences, Rudolph H. Raabe College of Pharmacy, Ohio Northern University, Ada, OH, USA.
Introduction: Opioids have served as a cornerstone in pain management for decades. However, the emergence of increasingly potent synthetic analogs brings forth a range of side effects, including respiratory depression, tolerance, dependence, constipation, and, more importantly, the development of severe and debilitating opioid use disorder (OUD). Search for therapeutics to mitigate OUD has been challenging and this has called for novel approaches that include design of small molecules targeting neuronal circuits involved in addiction (opioid, dopamine, serotonin, norepinephrine, and glutamate receptors, etc.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFChem Biodivers
January 2025
Guangxi University, School of Medicine, Xixiangtang district, 530004, Nanning, CHINA.
Antibiotic resistance is recognized as one of the top ten global public health threats, posing a significant challenge to human health. The stereochemistry of chiral molecules, alongside their specific interactions with biological targets, provides essential insights for the development of novel antibacterial agents, This study investigated the antibacterial activity of 32 previously synthesized 14-position chiral matrine derivatives. Among these derivatives, compound Q4 exhibited the strongest activity against Propionibacterium acnes, with a minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) of 0.
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