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Composition Variation (composition + variation)

Distribution by Scientific Domains
Life Sciences40%

Selected Abstracts

Incorporating life histories and diet quality in stable isotope interpretations of crustacean zooplankton

FRESHWATER BIOLOGY, Issue 7 2008
MARC VENTURA
Summary 1. Stable isotope studies have been extremely useful for improving general food web descriptions due to their ability to simultaneously summarize complex trophic networks and track the energy flow through them. However, when considering trophic relationships involving only two or few species, application of general isotopic interpretations based on average fractionation values may easily lead to misleading conclusions. In these cases a more accurate consideration of the current processes involved in the isotopic fractionation should be considered. 2. We investigated the trophic relationships of the crustacean zooplankton assemblage in an alpine lake (Lake Redon, Pyrenees) by means of stable isotopes of carbon and nitrogen and applied information on their life history and biochemical composition in the interpretation. 3. The three species occurring in the lake had distinct isotopic signatures: the two copepod species (the cyclopoid Cyclops abyssorum and the calanoid Diaptomus cyaneus) had higher nitrogen isotopic composition than the cladoceran (Daphnia pulicaria), indicative of a higher trophic position of the two copepods. Most intra-specific isotopic variability was associated with growth, while the effect of metabolic turnover was negligible. The effects of changes in the proportion of lipids was restricted to the adults of the two copepods. 4. Daphnia Juveniles showed ontogenetic shifts in their carbon, and nitrogen isotopic composition. Cyclops copepodites only showed changes in carbon isotopic composition. These isotopic shifts with changes in size were the result of: (i) the prevalence of growth over metabolic turnover as the main factor for isotopic variability and (ii) feeding, during the growth period, on isotopically depleted food in the case of Daphnia, and on isotopically enriched food in the case of Cyclops. 5. The carbon isotopic variation in Cyclops juveniles could be explained by fitting an isotopic growth model that considered that they fed entirely on Daphnia. However this was not the case for nitrogen isotopic variability. Cyclops nitrogen isotopic composition variation and the Cyclops to Daphnia nitrogen isotopic enrichment were closely correlated to the quantity of Daphnia protein and to the dissimilarity in the essential amino acid composition between the two species, which can be interpreted as an indication of consumer nitrogen limitation. [source]

Performance prediction of a refrigerating machine using R-407C: the effect of the circulating composition on system performance

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ENERGY RESEARCH, Issue 15 2002
P. Haberschill
Abstract This article presents a steady-state model of a vapour compression refrigerating machine using a ternary refrigerant mixture R-407C. When using a zeotropic mixture in a refrigerant cycle, the circulating composition does not agree with the composition of the original charged mixture. It is mainly due to the temperature glide and the vapour,liquid slip ratio. As a result of the composition shift and its magnitude, the system performance changes depending on the system design, especially the presence of liquid receiving vessels. In this paper, a method that predicts the circulating composition has been associated to a refrigerating machine model. The results obtained with this model show an enrichment in the most volatile components of about 1% for the circulating composition, which is sufficient to decrease the system performance by about 3%. Factors affecting the overall performance have been investigated. The results show a very strong performance dependence on the refrigerant charge. The COP can decrease by 25% when the refrigerant charge is insufficient. An initial charged composition variation of 2% involves variations of the cooling capacity of about 5%. Furthermore, our model was employed to compare the performance for both R-22 and R-407C. The cooling capacity for R-22 is slightly greater in comparison to R-407C and the COP is almost constant. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. [source]

Tight binding modelling of electronic band structure in conventional InGaN/GaN and dilute GaAsN/GaAs nitride heterostructures

PHYSICA STATUS SOLIDI (C) - CURRENT TOPICS IN SOLID STATE PHYSICS, Issue 2 2007
H. Hakan Gürel
Abstract We utilize a semi-empirical sp3s * tight binding model to investigate the strain and composition effects on electronic structure of conventional InGaN/GaN and dilute GaAsN/GaAs cubic nitride heterostructures. The model includes the second nearest neighbor (2NN) atomic interactions, spin-orbit splitting and nonlinear composition variation of atomic energies and bond lengths of ternaries. Results show that band gaps of conventional InGaN increase with composition for 0 < x < 1. However, the , band gap of dilute GaAsN decreases with composition for x < 0.25 and then starts to increase for 0.26 < x < 1. (© 2007 WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim) [source]

Transient compositional effects from feeders in a starved flow modular co-rotating twin-screw extruder

POLYMER ENGINEERING & SCIENCE, Issue 11 2002
Eung Kyu Kim
A process dynamics model of transient output composition variations in a moduar self-wiping twin-screw extruder caused by input disturbances from feeders is developed. The changes of output mass flow rate and weight fraction of additives in the output stream were predicted for various time dependent input modes into a second feeder and other ports part way along the length of the machine. [source]

Increasing the activity of monoclonal antibody therapeutics by continuous chromatography (MCSGP)

BIOTECHNOLOGY & BIOENGINEERING, Issue 4 2010
T. Müller-Späth
Abstract The charged monoclonal antibody (mAb) variants of the commercially available therapeutics Avastin®, Herceptin® and Erbitux® were separated by ion-exchange gradient chromatography in batch and continuous countercurrent mode (MCSGP process). Different stationary phases, buffer conditions and two MCSGP configurations were used in order to demonstrate the broad applicability of MCSGP in the field of charged protein variant separation. Batch chromatography and MCSGP were compared with respect to yield, purity, and productivity. In the case of Herceptin®, also the biological activity of the product stream was taken into account as performance indicator. The robustness of the MCSGP process against feed composition variations was confirmed experimentally and by model simulations. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2010;107:652,662. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. [source]