Microbial life in a liquid asphalt desert

Pitch Lake in Trinidad and Tobago is a natural asphalt reservoir nourished by pitch seepage, a form of petroleum that consists of mostly asphaltines, from the surrounding oil-rich region. During upward seepage, pitch mixes with mud and gases under high pressure, and the lighter portion evaporates or is volatilized, which produces a liquid asphalt residue characterized by low water activity, recalcitrant carbon substrates, and noxious chemical compounds. An active microbial community of archaea and bacteria, many of them novel strains (particularly from the new Tar ARC groups), totaling a biomass of up to 10(7) cells per gram, was found to inhabit the liquid hydrocarbon matrix of Pitch Lake. Geochemical and molecular taxonomic approaches revealed diverse, novel, and deeply branching microbial lineages with the potential to mediate anaerobic hydrocarbon degradation processes in different parts of the asphalt column. In addition, we found markers for archaeal methane metabolism and specific gene sequences affiliated with facultative and obligate anaerobic sulfur- and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria. The microbial diversity at Pitch Lake was found to be unique when compared to microbial communities analyzed at other hydrocarbon-rich environments, which included Rancho Le Brea, a natural asphalt environment in California, USA, and an oil well and a mud volcano in Trinidad and Tobago, among other sites. These results open a window into the microbial ecology and biogeochemistry of recalcitrant hydrocarbon matrices and establish the site as a terrestrial analogue for modeling the biotic potential of hydrocarbon lakes such as those found on Saturn's largest moon Titan.     

Physical-chemical treatment of wastes: a way to close turnover of elements in LSS.

"Man-plants-physical-chemical unit" system designed for space stations or terrestrial ecohabitats to close steady-state mineral, water and gas exchange is proposed. The physical-chemical unit is to mineralize all inedible plant wastes and physiological human wastes (feces, urine, gray water) by electromagnetically activated hydrogen peroxide in an oxidation reactor. The final product is a mineralized solution containing all elements balanced for plants' requirements. The solution has been successfully used in experiments to grow wheat, beans and radish. The solution was reusable: the evaporated moisture was replenished by the phytotron condensate. Sodium salination of plants was precluded by evaporating reactor-mineralized urine to sodium saturation concentration to crystallize out NaCl which can be used as food for the crew. The remaining mineralized product was brought back for nutrition of plants. The gas composition of the reactor comprises O2, N2, CO2, NH3, H2. At the reactor's output hydrogen and oxygen were catalyzed into water, NH3 was converted in a water trap into NH4 and used for nutrition of plants. A special accessory at the reactor's output may produce hydrogen peroxide from intrasystem water and gas which makes possible to close gas loops between LSS components.     

Synthesis of biomass and utilization of plants wastes in a physical model of biological life-support system

The paper considers problems of biosynthesis of higher plants' biomass and "biological incineration" of plant wastes in a working physical model of biological LSS. The plant wastes are "biologically incinerated" in a special heterotrophic block involving Californian worms, mushrooms and straw. The block processes plant wastes (straw, haulms) to produce soil-like substrate (SLS) on which plants (wheat, radish) are grown. Gas exchange in such a system consists of respiratory gas exchange of SLS and photosynthesis and respiration of plants. Specifics of gas exchange dynamics of high plants--SLS complex has been considered. Relationship between such a gas exchange and PAR irradiance and age of plants has been established. Nitrogen and iron were found to the first to limit plants' growth on SLS when process conditions are deranged. The SLS microflora has been found to have different kinds of ammonifying and denitrifying bacteria which is indicative of intensive transformation of nitrogen-containing compounds. The number of physiological groups of microorganisms in SLS was, on the whole, steady. As a result, organic substances--products of exchange of plants and microorganisms were not accumulated in the medium, but mineralized and assimilated by the biocenosis. Experiments showed that the developed model of a man-made ecosystem realized complete utilization of plant wastes and involved them into the intrasystem turnover.     

Mineralization of wastes of human vital activity and plants to be used in a Life Support System

Available methods for mineralizing wastes of human activity and inedible biomass of plants used in this country and abroad are divided into two types: dry mineralization at high temperatures up to 1270 K with subsequent partial dissolution of the ash and the other--wet oxidation by acids. In this case mineralization is performed at a temperature of 470-460 K and a pressure of 220-270 atmospheres in pure oxygen with the output of mineral solution and dissoluble sediments in the form of scale. The drawback of the first method is the formation of dioxins, CO, SO2, NO2 and other toxic compounds. The latter method is too sophisticated and is presently confined to bench testing. The here proposed method to mineralize the wastes is in mid-position between the thermal and physical chemical methods. At a temperature of 80-90 degrees C the mixture was exposed to a controlled electromagnetic field at normal atmospheric pressure. The method merits simplicity, reliability, produces no dissoluble sediment or emissions noxious for human and plants. The basic difference from the above said methods is to employ as an oxidizer atomic oxygen, its active forms including OH-radicals with hydrogen peroxide as the source. Hydrogen peroxide can be produced with electric power from water inside the Life Support System (LSS).     

The strong stability of most natural motions

Problems of Hamiltonian Mechanics can generally be simplified by some Von Zeipel transformations which reduce the influence of short period parameters and lead to very slowly variable functions: the “quasi-integrals”; however these transformations are implicit and then difficult to use.An explicit construction of the quasi-integrals is presented here and is used to integrate the motion of an artificial satellite perturbed by the zonal harmonics of the Earth gravitational potential; the quasi-integrals are also used to obtain informations on the stability of natural satellites, i.e. lower bounds on the duration of escape or capture.     

Microbial fuel cells applied to the metabolically based detection of extraterrestrial life

Since the 1970s, when the Viking spacecrafts carried out experiments to detect microbial metabolism on the surface of Mars, the search for nonspecific methods to detect life in situ has been one of the goals of astrobiology. It is usually required that a methodology detect life independently from its composition or form and that the chosen biological signature point to a feature common to all living systems, such as the presence of metabolism. In this paper, we evaluate the use of microbial fuel cells (MFCs) for the detection of microbial life in situ. MFCs are electrochemical devices originally developed as power electrical sources and can be described as fuel cells in which the anode is submerged in a medium that contains microorganisms. These microorganisms, as part of their metabolic process, oxidize organic material, releasing electrons that contribute to the electric current, which is therefore proportional to metabolic and other redox processes. We show that power and current density values measured in MFCs that use microorganism cultures or soil samples in the anode are much larger than those obtained with a medium free of microorganisms or sterilized soil samples, respectively. In particular, we found that this is true for extremophiles, which have been proposed as potential inhabitants of extraterrestrial environments. Therefore, our results show that MFCs have the potential to be used for in situ detection of microbial life.     

Potential climatic impact of organic haze on early Earth

We have explored the direct and indirect radiative effects on climate of organic particles likely to have been present on early Earth by measuring their hygroscopicity and cloud nucleating ability. The early Earth analog aerosol particles were generated via ultraviolet photolysis of an early Earth analog gas mixture, which was designed to mimic possible atmospheric conditions before the rise of oxygen. An analog aerosol for the present-day atmosphere of Saturn's moon Titan was tested for comparison. We exposed the early Earth aerosol to a range of relative humidities (RHs). Water uptake onto the aerosol was observed to occur over the entire RH range tested (RH=80-87%). To translate our measurements of hygroscopicity over a specific range of RHs into their water uptake ability at any RH < 100% and into their ability to act as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) at RH > 100%, we relied on the hygroscopicity parameter κ, developed by Petters and Kreidenweis. We retrieved κ=0.22?±0.12 for the early Earth aerosol, which indicates that the humidified aerosol (RH < 100 %) could have contributed to a larger antigreenhouse effect on the early Earth atmosphere than previously modeled with dry aerosol. Such effects would have been of significance in regions where the humidity was larger than 50%, because such high humidities are needed for significant amounts of water to be on the aerosol. Additionally, Earth organic aerosol particles could have activated into CCN at reasonable-and even low-water-vapor supersaturations (RH > 100%). In regions where the haze was dominant, it is expected that low particle concentrations, once activated into cloud droplets, would have created short-lived, optically thin clouds. Such clouds, if predominant on early Earth, would have had a lower albedo than clouds today, thereby warming the planet relative to current-day clouds.     

Microbial influences on local carbon isotopic ratios and their preservation in carbonate

Analysis of the carbon isotopic composition of carbonates is a valuable tool for studying microbial processes and looking for evidence of life. Microbial fixation of CO2 and conversion of organic carbon to CO2 can produce measurable delta 13C shifts in a microbial mat environment. Diffusion modeling demonstrates that substantial isotopic shifts can develop within the mat and in the diffusion boundary layer in the fluid when CO2 fixation is rapid and prolonged for several hours. Carbonates that precipitate during rapid CO2 fixation can preserve these microbially produced isotopic shifts. However, continued precipitation during intervals when respiration dominates or after the cessation of active microbial growth commonly dilutes autotrophic isotopic signatures. Thus, preserved isotopic signatures rarely reflect the magnitude of isotopic shifts within the mat. Interpretation of observed isotopic shifts in microbial mat carbonate depends on fully characterizing ambient delta 13C and eliminating other origins for isotopic shifts. The carbon isotopic composition of reservoirs can vary substantially, both on Earth and on other planets. Characterizing the reservoir composition and any changes through time is critical to evaluating microbially induced shifts. In addition, careful evaluation of non-microbial causes for shifts in isotopic composition is essential for a reliable interpretation. Complicating processes include recrystallization, calcite precipitation over extended periods of time, variable precipitation rates and water chemistry, and mixing of carbonates having different isotopic signatures.     

Microbial survival: the paleome: a sedimentary genetic record of past microbial communities

Molecular genetic methods were used to analyze the remnants of microbial ecosystems contained within an ancient oceanic microbial habitat that was recovered from a continental drilled core of black shale approximately 100 million years in age. Bacterial ribosomal RNA genes were vertically amplified from the six different depths of a black shale core associated with a phosphate-rich stratum, defined as one of the mid-Cretaceous oceanic anoxic events (OAEs). Although the black shale core was recovered from a terrestrial coring effort, the recovered 16S rRNA gene sequences showed affinity to microbial communities previously seen in deep-sea sedimentary environments (i.e., the microbial assemblage was easily recognizable as a marine community). In particular, a number of 16S rRNA gene clones of oceanic sulfate-reducing bacteria within the delta-Proteobacteria predominated at the OAE layer. The recovered bacterial DNA signatures are consistent with the interpretation that the sequences are derived from the past microbial communities buried in either sea-bottom or subseafloor environments during the sedimentation process and, after ceasing growth, preserved until the present.     

Remote sensing of natural formations from measurements of radiance coefficients

This paper is devoted to the consideration of some problems of remote sensing of natural formations using radiance coefficients in the narrow spectral invervals. The techniques for the determination of the most informative spectral intervals, as developed by the authors of the paper, are given and the results obtained are presented. The technique for obtaining the training sample of spectral radiance coefficients, with the help of a four-objective camera applied by the authors, is described. Some problems regarding the construction of a “universal” alphabet for classes of natural formations are discussed.     

Geometric structures of frames of reference and natural language semantics

This article aims at formal specifications of reference systems in spatial cognition. It concentrates on two roles of reference systems connected to spatial language: reference systems resolving ambiguities and reference systems forming a basis for the classification of linguistic terms. Although coordinate systems are often seen as candidates for the geometric structure of reference systems, it is shown here that they do not appear in the explanations that go into the details. An analysis of the German terms vor, hinter, rechts and links (in front of, in back of, right, left) presents an alternative model for the geometric structure of spatial reference systems.     

有机纤维/EPDM绝热材料性能研究

通过对腈纶短纤维、芳纶短纤维各自用量对EPDM绝热层材料烧蚀速率、孔隙率影响的研究,并结合氮气环境下热失重曲线和炭层SEM照片分析,发现腈纶短纤维不仅高温残炭率高于芳纶短纤维,而且可在较宽的温度范围内逐步热解炭化,烧蚀过程所产生的热解气体能逐步而快速地释放出炭层,结炭层孔隙率小,致密坚硬,能抵抗高温燃气流的烧蚀和冲蚀作用,材料的烧蚀速率较低;芳纶短纤维虽然具有较高的热稳定性,但热分解温度范围较窄,热解所产生的大量气体很难快速释放出炭层表面,结炭层孔隙率大,炭层疏松且呈层片状,不能抵抗高冲蚀性粒子流的烧蚀和冲蚀,烧蚀速率较高。     

Chemical mapping of proterozoic organic matter at submicron spatial resolution

A NanoSIMS ion microprobe was used to map the submicron-scale distributions of carbon, nitrogen, sulfur, silicon, and oxygen in organic microfossils and laminae in a thin section of the approximately 0.85 billion year old Bitter Springs Formation of Australia. The data provide clues about the original chemistry of the microfossils, the silicification process, and the biosignatures of specific microorganisms and microbial communities. Chemical maps of fossil unicells and filaments revealed distinct wall- and sheath-like structures enriched in C, N, and S, consistent with their accepted biological origin. Surprisingly, organic laminae, previously considered to be amorphous, also exhibited filamentous and apparently compressed spheroidal structures defined by strong enrichments in C, N, and S. By analogy to NanoSIMS data from the well-preserved microfossils, these structures were interpreted as being of biological origin, most likely representing densely packed remnants of microbial mats. Given that the preponderance of organic matter in Precambrian sediments is similarly "amorphous," our findings indicate that a re-evaluation of ancient specimens via in situ structural, chemical, and isotopic study is warranted. Our analyses have led us to propose new criteria for assessing the biogenicity of problematic kerogenous materials, and, thus, these criteria can be applied to assessments of poorly preserved or fragmentary organic residues in early Archean sediments and any that might occur in meteorites or other extraterrestrial samples.     

Effect of enclosure shape on natural convection velocities in microgravity

A numerical analysis was performed to compare natural convection velocities in two-dimensional enclosures of various shape. The following shapes were investigated: circle, square, horizontal and upright 2 × 1 aspect ratio rectangles, horizontal and upright half-circles, diamond (square oriented with diagonal vertical) and triangle (equilateral and horizontal base). In all cases, the length scale in the various dimensionless parameters, such as Rayleigh number, is defined as the diameter of the equal area circle. Natural convection velocities were calculated for Rayleigh numbers of 100 and 500 with the temperature difference taken to be across (a) the maximum horizontal dimension, (b) the median horizontal line (line through centroid) and (c) the horizontal distance such that the temperature gradient is the same for shapes of equal area. A Rayleigh number of 1000 is within the “low Rayleigh number” range for agreement with first order theory for circular enclosures. A Rayleigh number of 5000 is slightly out of this range. For the class of shapes including the square, upright half-circle and upright rectangle, the computed velocities were found to agree very closely with that of the equal area circle when the temperature difference is taken to be across the maximum horizontal dimension [condition (a)]. The velocities for the horizontal rectangle and half circle were found to be approximately one-half that of the equal area circle for the same condition. Better overall agreement among all shapes was obtained by setting the temperature difference across a distance such that the temperature gradients were equal for shapes of equal area.     

PBO纤维自然老化与加速老化的相关性研究

研究了PBO纤维在户外自然暴晒实验中纤维强度和分子量的变化规律,发现PBO纤维在暴晒初期纤维强度下降较快,但随着老化时间的延长,纤维强度下降趋势逐渐变缓。此外,文章还对比研究了人工加速老化过程中纤维强度的下降规律,并以强度保持率为参照标准,分别从老化时间和总辐照能量两方面比较了2种老化实验的相关性和加速因子。研究发现,基于老化时间作为参照时,在老化的不同阶段,加速因子的变化较大;而基于总辐照能量作为参照时,在纤维强度降低到原始强度的64%之前,可较好地利用人工加速老化实验结果来预测其在户外环境下的老化失效行为。     

有机阻燃剂对UPR包覆材料耐烧蚀性能的影响及分析

选取有机磷系阻燃剂A、氮系阻燃剂B和三聚氰胺C、卤系阻燃荆十溴联苯醚D,利用田口方法的望小特征系统研究了有机阻燃剂对UPR包覆材料耐烧蚀性能的影响,得到最佳配比为A:B:C:D=8:24:24:24,其中阻燃剂D对UPR线烧蚀率的影响最为显著.通过对烧蚀成炭层进行形貌分析,探讨了有机阻燃剂改性UPR包覆层的耐烧蚀特征;并结合阻燃剂/UPR复合材料的TG-DTG分析,探索了不同阻燃荆对改性UPR包覆材料耐烧蚀性能的作用机理.结果表明,磷系阻燃剂能促进UPR材料成炭,氮系阻燃剂通过气化作用保护UPR基体,卤系阻燃剂具有一定的气相阻燃和固相促进成炭作用.     

甲基丙烯酰氧基倍半硅氧烷对有机硅树脂耐热性能影响

采用甲基丙烯酰氧基倍半硅氧烷(M ethacryl-POSS)提高有机硅树脂的耐热性能。合成了甲基苯基硅树脂和M ethacryl-POSS接枝改性的甲基苯基硅树脂,采用傅立叶变换红外光谱表征了M ethacryl-POSS接枝反应前后甲基苯基硅树脂的结构变化;并通过TG和烧蚀实验比较了接枝反应前后甲基苯基硅树脂的热性能变化,采用DTG对比研究了M ethacr-yl-POSS对甲基苯基硅树脂耐热性影响机理。结果表明,经M ethacryl-POSS接枝改性后,甲基苯基硅树脂的耐热性能提高,在空气中的热降解程度降低。     

有机纤维长度对EPDM绝热层耐烧蚀性能的影响

为确定三元乙丙橡胶(EPDM)绝热材料配方中有机纤维长度对绝热层材料烧蚀性能的影响,采用光学显微镜和SEM分别表征混炼后纤维长度和形貌,并采用氧乙炔和高过载模拟烧蚀发动机研究不同长度芳纶纤维(PPTA)和聚酰亚胺纤维(PI)对EPDM绝热材料烧蚀性能影响规律。研究结果表明,混炼后初始长度1～6 mm的PPTA纤维经过混炼后形貌严重破损,长度均在1 mm左右,而PI纤维形貌无明显变化,仅初始长度4～6 mm的PI纤维断裂为2.5～3.5 mm;相同纤维长度下,PI纤维填充绝热层氧乙炔线烧蚀率明显低于PPTA纤维填充绝热层;随着PPTA纤维和PI纤维初始长度的增加,氧乙炔线烧蚀率和高过载模拟烧蚀发动机线烧蚀率降低,且PPTA纤维和PI纤维分别在初始长度4 mm和2 mm处氧乙炔线烧蚀率趋于稳定;1、3和5 mm的PPTA纤维与2～6 mm PI纤维共用填充绝热层氧乙炔线烧蚀率相当,但高过载模拟烧蚀发动机线烧蚀率则随着PI纤维长度的变短而降低,PPTA纤维长度变化对其无明显影响;采用初始长度2～3 mm的PI纤维单独或与一定比例PPTA纤维共用,其耐烧蚀性能最佳。