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Topic Review

Aerial Microbial Contamination

Air is recognized as an important source of microbial contamination in food production facilities and has the potential to contaminate the food product causing food safety and spoilage issues for the food industry. Potential for aerial microbial contamination of food can be a particular issue during storage in cold rooms when the food is not packaged and is exposed to contaminated air over a prolonged period. Thus, there are potential benefits for the food industry for an aerial decontamination in cold storage facilities. It is considered that current systems may not be completely effective and environmentally friendly, therefore, it is of great significance to consider the development of nonresidual and verified decontamination technologies for the food industry and, in particular, for the cold storage rooms.

8.9K
17 Dec 2020

Topic Review

Allelopathy is an ecological phenomenon in which organisms interfere with each other. As a management strategy in agricultural systems, allelopathy can be mainly used to control weeds, resist pests, and disease and improve the interaction of soil nutrition and microorganisms. Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) are allelochemicals volatilized from plants and have been widely demonstrated to have different ecological functions.

8.9K
09 Sep 2021

Topic Review

Plant-Dominant Low-Protein Diet

Plant-dominant low-protein diet (LPD), also abbreviated as "PLADO" is a patient-centered LPD of 0.6–0.8 g/kg/day composed of >50% plant-based sources, administered by dietitians trained in providing nutrition care to patients with non-dialysis-dependent chronic kidney disease (CKD). PLADO's composition and meal plans can be designed and adjusted based on individualized needs and according to the principles of precision nutrition. The goal of PLADO is to slow kidney disease progression, to avoid or delay dialysis therapy initiation, and to ensure cardiovascular health and longevity. The ideal type of PLADO is a heart-healthy, safe, flexible, and feasible diet that could be the centerpiece of the conservative and preservative management of CKD.

8.9K
05 Nov 2020

Topic Review

List of Most Successful U-boat Commanders

The list of most successful U-boat commanders contains the top-scoring German U-boat commanders in the two World Wars based on their total tonnage sunk. The tonnage figures (and sometimes the number of ships sunk) is still being debated among historians. This is often due to convoy battles at night when an attacking "wolfpack" fired torpedoes into the convoy and two (sometimes more) commanders claimed the same ship. Although post-war research has clarified most of those claims, some are still in question.

8.9K
04 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Fault Types and Effects of HVDC Transmission Systems

High voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission systems play a critical role to optimize resource allocation and stabilize power grid operation in the current power grid thanks to their asynchronous networking and large transmission capacity. To ensure the operation reliability of the power grid and reduce the outage time, it is imperative to realize fault diagnosis of HVDC transmission systems in a short time.

8.9K
11 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Bell Peppers (Capsicum annum L.)

The bell pepper is highly consumed worldwide due to its exotic colors (green, red, yellow, orange, and purple), flavor, and nutritional value. However, after processing bell pepper products, waste remains (seeds, peel, stem, and leaves), representing desirable raw material to obtain phytochemical compounds. They contain diverse bioactive compounds with interesting biological activities (in vivo and in vitro) and applications.

8.9K
22 Oct 2021

Topic Review

Woodward Effect

The Woodward effect, also referred to as a Mach effect, is part of a hypothesis proposed by James F. Woodward in 1990. The hypothesis states that transient mass fluctuations arise in any object that absorbs internal energy while undergoing a proper acceleration. Harnessing this effect could generate a reactionless thrust, which Woodward and others claim to measure in various experiments. Hypothetically, the Woodward effect would allow for field propulsion spacecraft engines that would not have to expel matter. Such a proposed engine is sometimes called a Mach effect thruster (MET) or a Mach Effect Gravitational Assist (MEGA) drive. So far, experimental results have not strongly supported this hypothesis, but experimental research on this effect, and its potential applications, continues. The Space Studies Institute was selected as part of NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts program as a Phase I proposal in April 2017 for Mach Effect research. The year after, NASA awarded a NIAC Phase II grant to the SSI to further develop these propellantless thrusters. The effect is controversial within mainstream physics because the underlying model proposed for it appears to be faulty, resulting in violations of energy conservation as well as momentum conservation.

8.9K
16 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Industry 4.0 and Sustainability

Sustainability and Industry 4.0 (I4.0) are trending concepts used in the literature on industrial processes. Industry 4.0 has been mainly addressed by the current literature from a technological perspective, overlooking sustainability challenges regarding this recent paradigm. The objective of this encyclopedia entry is to evaluate the state of the art of relations between sustainability and I4.0. The goal will be met by (1) mapping and summarizing existing research efforts, (2) identifying research agendas, (3) examining gaps and opportunities for further research. Web of Science, Scopus, and a set of specific keywords were used to select peer-reviewed papers presenting evidence on the relationship between sustainability and I4.0. To achieve this goal, it was decided to use a dynamic methodology called “systematic literature network analysis”. This methodology combines a systematic literature review approach with the analysis of bibliographic networks. Selected papers were used to build a reference framework formed by I4.0 technologies and sustainability issues. The encyclopedia entry contributes to the Sustainable Industry 4.0 reference framework with application procedures. It aims to show how I4.0 can support ideas of sustainability. The results showed that apart from a huge contribution to both concepts, many papers do not provide an insight into realization of initiatives to introduce Sustainable Industry 4.0.

8.8K
06 Jun 2021

Topic Review

Business Engineering

Business engineering (BE) is the development and implementation of business solutions, from business model to business processes and organizational structure to information systems and information technology (cf.). Business engineering focuses on developing innovative business solutions that take a sociotechnical systems (STS) approach. The STS approach addresses an enterprise as a total system in the same manner as an airplane system or an industrial facility, since they possess a similar level of complexity. Business engineering combines knowledge in the fields of business administration, Industrial Engineering, as well as information technology and connects it to all aspects of transformation, from means of presentation to process models to cultural and political considerations (cf. Baumöl/Jung).A person is referred to as a Business Engineer when the person is a hybrid between an entrepreneur and an engineer. They must poses the understanding of how the business world operates at both macro and micro levels and be in a position to come up with solutions based on various key elements.

8.8K
09 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Ego-Dystonic Sexual Orientation

Ego-dystonic sexual orientation is an ego-dystonic mental disorder characterized by having a sexual orientation or an attraction that is at odds with one's idealized self-image, causing anxiety and a desire to change one's orientation or become more comfortable with one's sexual orientation. It describes not innate sexual orientation itself, but a conflict between the sexual orientation one wishes to have and the sexual orientation one actually possesses.

8.8K
14 Oct 2022

Topic Review

WikiLeaks (/ˈwɪkiliːks/) is an international non-profit organisation that publishes news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous sources. Its website, initiated in 2006 in Iceland by the organisation Sunshine Press, stated in 2015 that it had released online 10 million documents in its first 10 years. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, is generally described as its founder and director. Since September 2018, Kristinn Hrafnsson has served as its editor-in-chief. WikiLeaks has variously described itself as an organization of journalists, political activists, mathematicians, and start-up company technologists, an intermediary between sources and journalists, an advocacy group for sources, and a public intelligence agency. The group has released a number of prominent document caches that exposed serious violations of human rights and civil liberties to the US and international public. Early releases included documentation of equipment expenditures and holdings in the Afghanistan war, a report about a corruption investigation in Kenya, and an operating procedures manual for the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. In April 2010, WikiLeaks released the Collateral Murder footage from the 12 July 2007 Baghdad airstrike in which Iraqi Reuters journalists were among several civilians killed. Other releases in 2010 included the Afghan War Diary and the "Iraq War Logs". The latter release allowed the mapping of 109,032 deaths in "significant" attacks by insurgents in Iraq that had been reported to Multi-National Force – Iraq, including about 15,000 that had not been previously published. In 2010, WikiLeaks also released classified diplomatic cables that had been sent to the US State Department. In April 2011, WikiLeaks began publishing 779 secret files relating to prisoners detained in the Guantanamo Bay detention camp. In 2012, WikiLeaks released the "Syria Files," over two million emails sent by Syrian politicians, corporations and government ministries. In 2015, WikiLeaks published Saudi Arabian diplomatic cables, documents detailing spying by the U.S. National Security Agency on successive French presidents, and the intellectual property chapter of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a controversial international trade agreement which had been negotiated in secret. During the 2016 U.S. presidential election campaign, WikiLeaks released emails and other documents from the Democratic National Committee and from Hillary Clinton's campaign manager, John Podesta, showing that the party's national committee favoured Clinton over her rival Bernie Sanders in the primaries, leading to the resignation of DNC chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz and an apology to Sanders from the DNC. These releases caused significant harm to the Clinton campaign, and have been attributed as a potential contributing factor to her loss in the general election against Donald Trump. The U.S. intelligence community expressed "high confidence" that the leaked emails had been hacked by Russia and supplied to WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks said that the source of the documents was not Russia or any other state. During the campaign, WikiLeaks promoted conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton and the Democratic Party. In 2016, WikiLeaks released nearly 300,000 emails it described as coming from Turkey's ruling Justice and Development Party, later found to be taken from public mailing archives, and rereleased over 50,000 emails from the Turkish Minister of Energy and Natural Resources. In 2017, WikiLeaks published internal CIA documents describing tools used by the agency to hack devices including mobile phones and routers. In 2019, WikiLeaks published over 30,000 files as part of the Fishrot Files, exposing corruption at Samherji, a multinational fishing company based in Iceland. In October 2021, WikiLeaks' secure chat stopped working and in February 2022 their submission system and email server went offline. The organisation has been criticised for inadequately curating its content and violating the personal privacy of individuals. WikiLeaks has, for instance, revealed Social Security numbers, medical information, credit card numbers and details of suicide attempts.

8.8K
11 Oct 2022

Topic Review

Mediterranean Climate

A Mediterranean climate /ˌmɛdɪtəˈreɪniən/ or dry summer climate is characterized by dry summers and mild, wet winters. The climate receives its name from the Mediterranean Basin, where this climate type is most common. Mediterranean climate zones are typically located along the western sides of continents, between roughly 30 and 45 degrees north and south of the equator. The main cause of Mediterranean, or dry summer climate, is the subtropical ridge which extends northwards during the summer and migrates south during the winter due to increasing north-south temperature differences. The resulting vegetation of Mediterranean climates are the garrigue or maquis in the Mediterranean Basin, the chaparral in California, the fynbos in South Africa, the mallee in Australia, and the matorral in Chile. Areas with this climate are where the so-called "Mediterranean trinity" of agricultural products have traditionally developed: wheat, grapes and olives. Most historic cities of the Mediterranean basin lie within Mediterranean climatic zones, including Algiers, Athens, Barcelona, Beirut, İzmir, Jerusalem, Marseille, Naples, Rome, Tunis, Valencia, and Valletta. Major cities with Mediterranean climates outside of the Mediterranean basin include Adelaide, Cape Town, Casablanca, Dushanbe, Lisbon, Los Angeles , Perth, Porto, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco , San Jose, CA, Santiago, Tashkent and Victoria.

8.8K
07 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Viroids: Definition and Features

Viroids are plant-restricted parasites that represent a remarkable model system to analyze many aspects of host-pathogen interactions at the genomic level. As the smallest known agents of infectious disease (247-401 nucleotides, nt), they have a highly structured, single-stranded circular naked and non-coding RNA genome. Although the list of known diseases caused by viroids and molecular characterization of the causative agents has expanded since they were discovered, their origin, evolution, and interaction with host genetic machinery to induce symptoms or escape the defensive system remain unclear.

8.8K
01 Nov 2020

Biography

William Maher (/mɑːr/; born January 20, 1956)[1] is an American comedian, political commentator, and television host. He is known for the HBO political talk show Real Time with Bill Maher (2003–present) and the similar late-night show called Politically Incorrect (1993–2002), originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC. Maher is known for his political satire[2] and sociopolitical comme

8.8K
29 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Transfersomes are elastic in nature, which can deform and squeeze themselves as an intact vesicle through narrow pores that are significantly smaller than its size. Encapsulating the drugs in transfersomes are one of the potential approaches to overcome the barrier function of the skin’s outermost layer. They have a bilayered structure that facilitates the encapsulation of lipophilic and hydrophilic, as well as amphiphilic, drug with higher permeation efficiencies compared to conventional liposomes.

8.8K
23 Sep 2020

Topic Review

ICO (File Format)

The ICO file format is an image file format for computer icons in Microsoft Windows. ICO files contain one or more small images at multiple sizes and color depths, such that they may be scaled appropriately. In Windows, all executables that display an icon to the user, on the desktop, in the Start Menu, or in Windows Explorer, must carry the icon in ICO format. The CUR file format is an almost identical image file format for non-animated cursors in Microsoft Windows. The only differences between these two file formats are the bytes used to identify them and the addition of a hotspot in the CUR format header; the hotspot is defined as the pixel offset (in x,y coordinates) from the top-left corner of the cursor image where the user is actually pointing the mouse.

8.8K
04 Nov 2022

Topic Review

List of Asteroids in Astrology

Asteroids are relatively new to astrology, having only been discovered in the 19th century. However, some of them (especially the largest of them), are believed by some astrologers to influence human affairs. Still though, they are often ignored within mainstream systems of astrology, especially in more traditional astrology systems like Vedic astrology or Hellenistic astrology. Their use has become significant to a few Western astrologers yet still only a minority of astrologers use the asteroids in chart interpretation.

8.8K
22 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Pentium FDIV Bug

The Pentium FDIV bug is a hardware bug affecting the floating point unit (FPU) of the early Intel Pentium processors. Because of the bug, the processor might return incorrect binary floating point results when dividing a number. The bug was discovered in 1994 by Professor Thomas R. Nicely at Lynchburg College. Intel attributed the error to missing entries in the lookup table used by the floating-point division circuitry. The severity of the FDIV bug is debated. Though rarely encountered by most users (Byte magazine estimated that 1 in 9 billion floating point divides with random parameters would produce inaccurate results), both the flaw and Intel's initial handling of the matter were heavily criticized by the tech community. In December 1994, Intel recalled the defective processors. In January 1995, Intel announced "a pre-tax charge of $475 million against earnings, ostensibly the total cost associated with replacement of the flawed processors."

8.8K
04 Nov 2022

Topic Review

Activity of Kalanchoe pinnata in Cancer

Kalanchoe pinnata (Lam) Pers. (syn. Bryophyllum pinnatum Lam.), belonging to the genus Kalanchoe, is a succulent plant cultivated in gardens, which can be found as a herb or shrub. The bioactive ingredients in Kalanchoe pinnata, a succulent herb with ethnomedical applications for several diseases, including cancer, and reveal its anticancer mechanisms through a molecular approach.

8.8K
17 Oct 2022

Topic Review

Democratic Socialism

Democratic socialism is a political philosophy that supports political democracy and some form of a socially owned economy,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) with a particular emphasis on economic democracy, workplace democracy, and workers' self-management within a market socialist economy, or an alternative form of decentralised planned socialist economy. Democratic socialists argue that capitalism is inherently incompatible with the values of freedom, equality, and solidarity and that these ideals can only be achieved through the realisation of a socialist society. Although most democratic socialists seek a gradual transition to socialism,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) democratic socialism can support either revolutionary or reformist politics as means to establish socialism.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) Democratic socialism was popularized by socialists who were opposed to the backsliding towards a one-party state in the Soviet Union and other nations during the 20th century.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) The history of democratic socialism can be traced back to 19th-century socialist thinkers across Europe and the Chartist movement in Britain, which somewhat differed in their goals but shared a common demand of democratic decision making and public ownership of the means of production, and viewed these as fundamental characteristics of the society they advocated for. In the late 19th to the early 20th century, democratic socialism was also heavily influenced by the gradualist form of socialism promoted by the British Fabian Society and Eduard Bernstein's evolutionary socialism in Germany.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) Democratic socialism is what most socialists understand by the concept of socialism;({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) it may be a very broad (socialists who reject a one-party Marxist–Leninist state)({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) or more limited concept (post-war social democracy).({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) As a broad movement, it includes forms of libertarian socialism,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) market socialism,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) reformist socialism, and revolutionary socialism,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) as well as ethical socialism,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) liberal socialism,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) social democracy,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) and some forms of state socialism and utopian socialism, all of which share commitment to democracy.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) Democratic socialism is contrasted with Marxism–Leninism, which opponents often perceive as being authoritarian and undemocratic in practice.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) Democratic socialists oppose the Stalinist political system and the Soviet-type economic planning system, rejecting as their form of governance the administrative-command system that formed in the Soviet Union and other Marxist–Leninist states during the 20th century. Democratic socialism is also distinguished from Third Way social democracy[nb 1] on the basis that democratic socialists are committed to systemic transformation of the economy from capitalism to socialism.[nb 2] While having socialism as a long-term goal,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) some moderate democratic socialists are more concerned about curbing capitalism's excesses, and are supportive of progressive reforms to humanise it in the present day,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) while other democratic socialists believe that economic interventionism and similar policy reforms aimed at addressing social inequalities and suppressing the economic contradictions of capitalism would only exacerbate the contradictions,({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) causing them to emerge elsewhere under a different guise.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) Those democratic socialists believe that the fundamental issues with capitalism are systemic in nature, and can only be resolved by replacing the capitalist mode of production with the socialist mode of production through the replacement of private ownership with collective ownership of the means of production, and extending democracy to the economic sphere in the form of industrial democracy.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) The main criticism of democratic socialism is focused on the compatibility of democracy and socialism. Several academics and political commentators tend to distinguish between authoritarian socialism and democratic socialism as a political ideology, with the first representing the Soviet Bloc, and the latter representing the democratic socialist parties in the Western Bloc countries that have been democratically elected in countries such as Britain, France, and Sweden, among others.({{{1}}}, {{{2}}}) However, following the end of the Cold War, many of these countries have moved away from socialism as a neoliberal consensus replaced the social democratic consensus in the advanced capitalist world.

8.8K
17 Oct 2022

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