In the presented review, we have summarized and highlighted recent developments in the use of lignin peroxidase (LiP) to remove a variety of pollutants from water matrices. The high redox potential of LiP is underlined by its excellent catalytic functionalities in the elimination of pharmaceuticals, phenolics, dyes, polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), and other miscellaneous pollutants. LiP-based computational frameworks for theoretical bioremediation of multiple pollutants have also been discussed, which have prompted a rise in scientific interest. According to current studies, both free and immobilized LiPs are biocatalysts capable of efficient pollutant degradation and LMW transformation. Some immobilized LiP preparations demonstrated excellent recyclability, enabling its reusability in multiple catalytic cycles. Additionally, computational degradability makes it easier to comprehend the mechanisms underlying the degradation of recalcitrant pollutants. The capacity of LiP to cleave C–C and C–O–C bonds has led to its widespread application as a biocatalyst. Its outstanding potential to catalyze oxidative cleavage has been effectively used in the remediation of pollutants without needing mediators. Nevertheless, we brought attention to the current LiP system in pollutants remediation and computational framework, which has generated a significant rise in scientific interest.

Metall- und Maschinenbauunternehmen müssen im Durchschnitt pro Jahr ca. zwei Prozent ihres Umsatzes für Strom und Erdgas ausgeben und die Unternehmer gehen von weiteren Preissteigerungen aus. Damit rückt das Thema Energieeinsparung stärker denn je in den Fokus und wird zu einem strategischen Faktor. Um Kosten zu sparen und Wettbewerbsvorteile zu sichern, ist es notwendig, zielgenaue Energieeinsparmaßnahmen einzuleiten. Die ersten Maßnahmen, welche die meisten Maschinenbauunternehmen umsetzen, sind die Erneuerung der Beleuchtungs-, Heizungs- und Lüftungsanlage, die Verbesserung der Drucklufterzeugung sowie die thematische Sensibilisierung der Mitarbeiter. Aber auch in Maschinen mit ihren dazugehörigen elektrischen Antrieben, Lüftern und Aggregaten verbirgt sich eine große Menge an Optimierungspotenzial. Allerdings ist es hier notwendig nicht die Verbraucher im Einzelnen, sondern die Maschine und deren Prozesse im Ganzen zu betrachten. Meist fehlen hierfür aber geeignete Schnittstellen, um die Messwerte von Sensoren (bspw. Temperatur-, Drucksensoren, etc.) und Antrieben auslesen zu können, was dazu führt, dass diese Potenziale nicht ausgeschöpft werden.

The average metal and mechanical engineering company must spend around two per cent of its annual turnover on electricity and natural gas, and companies are expecting further price increases.As a result, the issue of energy saving is becoming more of a strategic factor than ever before.In order to save costs and ensure competitive advantages, it is necessary to introduce precise energy-saving measures.The first steps taken by most mechanical engineering companies are to replace lighting, heating, and ventilation systems, improve compressed air generation and raise employee awareness.However, there is also a great potential for optimization in machines with their individual electrical drives, fans, and units.In this case, though, it is necessary to look at the machine and its processes as a whole rather than the individual electrical energy consumers.In most cases, however, there is a lack of suitable interfaces for analyzing the measured values from sensors (e.g.temperature, pressure sensors, etc.) and drives, which concludes that this potential is not fully exploited.The condition monitoring solution developed at the ICM -Institut Chemnitzer Maschinen und Anlagenbau e.V. aims to digitalize existing machines without making any structural changes to them or interfering with their existing controls.

Lignin modifying enzymes (LMEs) have gained widespread recognition in depolymerization of lignin polymers by oxidative cleavage. LMEs are a robust class of biocatalysts that include lignin peroxidase (LiP), manganese peroxidase (MnP), versatile peroxidase (VP), laccase (LAC), and dye-decolorizing peroxidase (DyP). Members of the LMEs family act on phenolic, non-phenolic substrates and have been widely researched for valorization of lignin, oxidative cleavage of xenobiotics and phenolics. LMEs implementation in the biotechnological and industrial sectors has sparked significant attention, although its potential future applications remain underexploited. To understand the mechanism of LMEs in sustainable pollution mitigation, several studies have been undertaken to assess the feasibility of LMEs in correlating to diverse pollutants for binding and intermolecular interactions at the molecular level. However, further investigation is required to fully comprehend the underlying mechanism. In this review we presented the key structural and functional features of LMEs, including the computational aspects, as well as the advanced applications in biotechnology and industrial research. Furthermore, concluding remarks and a look ahead, the use of LMEs coupled with computational framework, built upon artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML), has been emphasized as a recent milestone in environmental research.

Disposal of carbon-rich wastes, such as food waste, is one of the several environmental concerns raised nowadays. Conversion of organic residues by dark fermentation produces short-chain (C 1 –C 6 ) carboxylic acids, which are valuable chemical building blocks. The objective of this study was to optimize the operational parameters and perform comparative studies of cyclic and batch mode dark fermentation for carboxylic acid production from food waste. A maximum yield of short-chain carboxylic acids (SCCAs) 0.21 ± 0.012 g-SCCAs/g-TS in 50 g-TS/L was obtained in the cyclic mode as compared with the 0.13 ± 0.011 g-SCCAs/g-TS in the batch mode. The results showed that the use of the cyclic mode increased the carboxylic acid yield from 54 (batch mode) to 88%.

Food resources are limited in arid countries such as the United Arab Emirates (UAE); the salinity of the groundwater, together with a lack of natural fresh water sources and arable land, force the country to import most of its food. However, seaweed could play an important role in providing a locally available food resource, as it does not require fresh water and arable land to grow. The traditional use of several seaweed species as food sources has been documented in Asia and the Americas, where their nutritional composition has been well reported. Although the UAE’s aquatic environment is quite harsh due to high water salinity (over 40 g/L) and high surface water temperatures (over 35 °C), its native seaweed species could play a role as a food source in this arid region, thereby bolstering the country’s level of food security. To evaluate its potential in this context, fresh samples of the native Ulva intestinalis seaweed were collected in the shallow waters of Abu Dhabi Emirate, UAE. These samples were calculated to contain 34.38 ± 0.24 kcal, with a biomass composition of 5.185 ± 0.04% carbohydrate, 3.32 ± 0.14% protein, and 0.04 ± 0.01% fat (by dry matter). Of all the minerals present in the biomass, potassium had the highest concentration (7947 ± 319.5 ppm), followed by magnesium (3075.9 ± 1357 ppm) and sodium (756.3 ± 478 ppm). The water-soluble vitamins B1, B2, B3, B6, and C were below the detection limit in the samples. The rich concentration of essential minerals such as potassium, magnesium, iron and zinc in Ulva intestinalis makes it a promising novel food source. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first experimental study to examine the feasibility of using seaweed that is native to the UAE as a nutritional and sustainable food source in order to address the challenge of food security currently being faced by the country.

Biological methanation is the production of CH4 from CO2 and H-2. While this approach to carbon capture utilization have been widely researched in the recent years, there is a gap in the technology. The gap is towards the flexibility in biomethanation, utilizing biological trickling filters (BTF). With the current intermittent energy system, electricity is not a given surplus energy which will interfere with a continuous operation of biomethanation and will result in periods of operational downtime. This study investigated the effect of temperature and H-2 supply during downtimes, to optimize the time needed to regain initial performance. Short (6 h), medium (24 h) and long (72 h) downtimes were investigated with combinations of three different temperatures and three different flow rates. The results from these 27 experiments showed that with the optimized parameters, it would take 60 min to reach 98.4% CH4 in the product gas for a short downtime, whereas longer downtimes needed 180 min to reach 91.0% CH4. With these results, the flexibility of biomethanation in BTFs have been proven feasible. This study shows that biomethanation in BTFs can be integrated into any intermittent energy system and thereby is a feasible Power-2-X technology.

Research within biological methanation has been a great development using biotrickling filters (BTF), as a power-to-x solution, but research within up scaling is missing. This study investigates the commercial potential of biomethanation in BTF by operating two 1 m3 reactors which was implemented into a full-scale biogas plant. Several areas were investigated, such as enrichment and start-up, long-term steady state operation, serial operation, and intermittent feed. A methane productivity of 9.44 Nm3CH4 ma day -1 with a product gas of 95.7 % CH4 was obtained for parallel operation, whereas during serial operation a methane productivity of 10.6 Nm3CH4 ma day -1 at 97.4 % CH4 was achieved. The flexibility of the biomethanation was demonstrated with unintentional loss of H2 feed in periods of 12 to 72 h, where initial performance was regained within 6 to 12 h. The results from this study demonstrate the potential for commercial use of biomethanation in BTF for future Power-to-X solutions.

The global warming and energy requirement have accentuated the need to convert atmospheric CO2 into fuels through a highly efficient photoelectrochemical cell (PEC) process. Typically, CO2 reduction at the cathode is accompanied by water oxidation at the anode to produce O-2, which is not of significant value. Herein, we report the design of paired PEC to reduce CO2 to CH3OH and the oxidation of furfural (FF) to 2-furoic acid (2-FA) and 5-hydroxyfumic acid (5-HFA). The paired PEC electrolyzer was constructed with Au/alpha-Fe2O3/RGO and Ru/RGO/Pt based asymmetric electrodes. The photocathode-driven PEC CO2 conversion test showed a high CH3OH yield of 63 mu mol L-1 cm(-2) at 21.5 % quantum efficiency with a Faradaic efficiency of 91 % at -0.6 V under visible light. The anodic furfural oxidation test demonstrated a higher FF conversion (82 %) with higher yields of 2-FA and 5-HFA. This study showed the potential of the paired PEC process to produce valuable products at both electrodes.

With rising environmental concerns on the use of conventional, non-renewably sourced plastics, alternatives such as bioplastics and their impacts on the environment have been studied to replace the use of conventional plastics. In this study, life-cycle-assessment (LCA) was performed on a novel plastic, namely, whey plastic, i.e. plastic produced from whey protein, which is a residue of cheese-making process. Cradle-to-gate analysis was performed using the CML Baseline Method in SimaPro software. The results showed that for each 1000 kg of whey plastic produced, 2900 MJ of energy was consumed, 115.3 kg CO2 was emitted, 82.5 kg NOx was emitted, and it had the lowest global warming potential, freshwater, and marine aquatic toxicities, compared to other conventional plastics. Sensitivity analyses include transportation and land use changes were considered. Copolymer PEGMA was found to be a major contributor of environmental damages, hence replacement or modification of the chemical was suggested for future studies.

The design of cost-effective and high-performance bimetallic catalysts has become crucial for the effective conversion of biomass-derived pyrolysis-oil (Py-oil) into liquid biofuels. New bimetallic Ni3Fe catalysts were developed for effective hydrodeoxygenation (HDO) of Py-oil derived from date seeds. Ni3Fe catalyst showed a well-defined octagon-like morphology with a diameter of 120 nm and high saturation magnetization (Ms) of 78 emu g(-1) at room temperature. Py-oil was subjected to catalytic HDO processes at 250 degrees C for 120 min in a 10 bar H-2 atmosphere in the presence of Ni3Fe catalyst. Characterization results confirmed HDO of several components of Py-oil, including phenols, acids, aldehyde and ketones, sugars and aromatic hydrocarbons over the surfaces of Ni3Fe catalyst. The obtained upgraded Py-oil (HDO Py-oil) showed the highest hydrocarbons content of 23.77%, higher heating value (HHV) of 36.78 MJ kg(-1), and lower content of water, total acid number, and viscosity than fresh Py-oil. Bimetallic Ni3Fe catalyst resulted in better HDO performance and reusability for five consecutive cycles than recently reported monometallic or noble metal nanocatalysts. Plausible reaction pathways for the formation of major components including ethane, ethyl acetate, 2,5-dimethylfuran, D-sorbitol, methylcyclohexane, furfural alcohol, and 1,5-pentane diols are discussed. Results demonstrate that this simple and active bimetallic catalytic system leads to a cutting-edge liquid biofuels production pathway in the future.

Bio-based plastics, produced from natural and renewable sources, have been found to be good replacers to petroleum-based plastics. However, economic analyses have not been carried out for most of them, specifically those from whey. In this study, a techno-economic assessment of the industrial-scale production of plastics from whey protein is carried out considering two different scenarios: (1) low-cost dairy waste whey (DWP) and (2) purchased whey protein concentrate (WPC), as feedstocks, using SuperPro Designer software. Key economic indicators such as operating cost, capital investment, annual revenue, payback time, and return-on-investment (ROI), were analyzed. Sensitivity analyses of different parameters were performed to account for market fluctuations and other uncertainties, using Scenario 2 as the base case. Results showed that both scenarios have the capacity of producing over 3200 metric tons/year (t/yr) (or 5.5 t/batch) of plastic. With the unit selling price of plastic set at $7,000/t, both the scenarios showed profitable outcomes with the plant’s payback time of 3.7 and 2.4 years, and ROI of 27.1% and 42.2%, for Scenario 1 and Scenario 2, respectively. Sensitivity analyses showed that the unit plastic selling price was the most sensitive parameter, followed by the amount of feedstock WPC, and the number of batches.

In this review, we focus on the literature that described the various unit operations in a process design flowsheet of biorefineries. We begin by establishing the accepted definitions of a biorefinery, go on to describe how to categorize biorefineries, and finally review the literature on biorefinery process designs by listing the unit operation in each process design. Distinguishing biorefineries based on feedstock, the types of processing units, and the products emanating from the biorefinery are discussed.

The prevailing trends in global energy consumption and the rapid depletion of fossil fuel present an urgent need for alternative fuels, particularly from renewable sources of biomass. In this study, date palm tree mixture wastes (DTM) and date seed (DS) biomass were used as starting materials in the production of bio-oil by pyrolysis. The yields of the pyrolysis oils from DTM and DS were optimized by tuning the experimental parameters. The DS provided a maximum yield of 68 wt% obtained from 30 min of pyrolysis with a biomass loading of 200 g, fluidizing gas flow rate of 10 mL min 1, and at a temperature of 500 degrees C. In addition, we evaluated the impact of the aging process of the obtained pyrolysis oils. The produced pyrolysis oils (freshly made) were aged for 15 and 30 days at room temperature under closed conditions. All the feedstock biomass were subjected to proximate and ultimate analysis. The TG-DTA results indicated that both biomasses were richer in cellulose and hemicellulose contents than in lignin content. The FT-IR and GC/MS analyses of the fresh and aged oil samples demonstrated the outstanding characteristics of the DS derived bio-oil for use as a bio-fuel. The variation in the chemical composition of the fresh and aged pyrolysis oils are completely described and presented elaborately. This study demonstrates the significance of and a new functionality for the date palm industry to process date palm wastes, particularly the DS as a rich biomass source for the production of bio-fuel.

Das ossifizierende Fibrom, ein seltener Schädeltumor, tritt vor allem in der rostralen Mandibula, vornehmlich bei jungen Pferden (< 1 Jahr) auf.

Implementing microalgae biorefinery in arid environments requires utilization of strains that can grow at high temperatures (above 28 °C) and salinity levels (above 30 ppt). In this study, we investigate the newly isolated seawater strain, Synechococcus, native to the United Arab Emirates, and evaluate its value as a perspective organism for cultivation (for fuel and bio-products) in regions with freshwater scarcity. The strain displayed tolerance to a wide range of temperature (22–37 °C) and salinity (20–41 ppt), with maximum biomass concentration of 0.72 g L−1 and a maximum growth rate of 82 mg L−1 d−1 at 25 °C and 33 ppt salinity. Lipids accumulation reached up to 26% of dry weight in nitrogen-depleted conditions (with 1.8 mM of nitrates addition to the media), whereas protein content exceeded 50% dry weight. In this study, harvesting is investigated using three chemical agents: Ferric chloride, sodium hydroxide, and chitosan. Cell disruption is analyzed for four distinct treatments: Enzymatic, alkaline, ultrasonic, and hydrothermal. Among tested methods, flocculation with sodium hydroxide and ultrasonication were found to be the most efficient techniques for harvesting and cell disruption, respectively. The growth characteristics of the local strain and the potential to derive protein and lipids from it makes it a promising biomass in a biorefinery context.