All the regulations that define a maximum concentration of metals in the receiving soil are based on total soil metal concentration. However, the potential toxicity of a heavy metal in the soil depends on its speciation and availability. We studied the effects of heavy metal speciation and availability on soil microorganism activities along a Cu/Zn contamination gradient. Microbial biomass and ...

The atomic-scale structure of Bioglass and the effect of substituting lithium for sodium within these glasses have been investigated using neutron diffraction and solid state magic angle spinning (MAS) NMR. Applying an effective isomorphic substitution difference function to the neutron diffraction data has enabled the Na-O and Li-O nearest-neighbour correlations to be isolated from the overlap...

A prospective study was performed to investigate changes in metal levels and chromosome aberrations in patients within 2 years of receiving metal-on-metal hip arthroplasties. There was a statistically significant increase of cobalt and chromium concentrations, with a small increase in molybdenum, in whole blood at 6, 12, and 24 months after surgery. There was also a statistically significant in...

Determining the structures of nanoparticles at atomic resolution is vital to understand their structure-property correlations. Large metal nanoparticles with core diameter beyond 2 nm have, to date, eluded characterization by single-crystal X-ray analysis. Here we report the chemical syntheses and structures of two giant thiolated Ag nanoparticles containing 136 and 374 Ag atoms (that is, up to...

The objective of this study was to quantify the relationships between heavy metal concentrations in soil, leaf litter, and ground beetles at four sampling sites of a forest ecosystem in Medvednica Nature Park, Croatia. Ground beetles were sampled by pitfall trapping. Specimens were dry-ashed and soil and beetle samples digested with nitric acid. Lead, cadmium, copper, zinc, manganese, and iron ...

A superconductor in contact with a normal metal not only induces superconducting correlations, known as the proximity effect, but also modifies the density of states at some distance from the interface. These modifications can be resolved experimentally in microstructured systems. We therefore study the local density of states N(E ,x) of a superconductor–normal-metal heterostructure. We find a ...

Haematological (WBC, RBC, Hgb and Hct) and genotoxicity (MNT) parameters, hepatic enzymatic activities (GST, GPx and GR), and a histopathological evaluation of liver, kidneys and gonads were assessed as general biomarkers of metal pollution in the shrew Crocidura russula inhabiting a pyrite mining area. Specimens exposed to metals presented a few significant alterations when compared with refer...

Cs3C60 is an antiferromagnetic insulator that under pressure (P) becomes metallic and superconducting below Tc = 38 K. The superconducting dome present in the T - P phase diagram close to a magnetic state reminds what found in superconducting cuprates and pnictides, strongly suggesting that superconductivity is not of the conventional Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) type We investigate the insu...

Studies of the electromagnetic response of various classes of correlated electron materials including transition-metal oxides, organic and molecular conductors, intermetallic compounds with d and f electrons, as well as magnetic semiconductors are reviewed. Optical inquiry into correlations in all these diverse systems is enabled by experimental access to the fundamental characteristics of an e...

Two distinct polarised neutron techniques are applicable to the. study of magnetic diffuse scattering. The first, used for ferromagnetic alloys, employs a polarised incident beam without analysis of the outgoing polarisation. This method has been widely used, chiefly by the Oak Ridge group, to study moment disturbances in ferromagnetic binary transition metal alloys. The second technique involv...