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Materials development is increasingly recognized as a valuable venue for narrowing the research–practice gap. This qualitative case study explores how four middle school teachers and three university researchers collaborated in a community of practice (CoP) to write textbooks by highlighting the interplay between their collaborative relationships and actions. Data were collected from several sources, including semi-structured interviews, observations, and artifacts. The findings reveal that this textbook writing CoP was characterized by the interplay of joint enterprise, mutual engagement, and a shared repertoire; mutual engagement, featuring dynamic interaction between the participants’ collaborative relationships and actions, played a pivotal role. In light of a nuanced interpretation of teacher–researcher collaboration in this CoP, we foreground the role of mutual engagement and the factors which influence it. The study concludes by highlighting the mutually reinforcing nature of the dynamic interplay between language teachers’ collaborative relationships and actions in bridging the research–practice gap in communities.

Offers insight into consumption in America and the pitfalls of a system that promotes obsolescence and replacing versus repairing consumer goods, revealing contributing economic theories while calling for environmentally responsible changes.

Open textbooks, freely available open educational resources, have an ever-growing presence in learning environments around the world, though detailed studies of their development are rare. The challenges of tracking textbook writing activity in a precise manner over time may account for this sparsity. To highlight how process-tracing research can contribute insight to the textbook development literature, particularly that focused on open textbook writing, this study addresses the roles that think-aloud protocols (TAPs) played during the construction of an open corequisite writing textbook. The volume, which was designed with underprepared university students in mind, stresses the growth of academic and workplace writing skills together with effective study techniques, and its two novice coursebook authors used self-recorded concurrent verbalization and interviews to document its creation. By analyzing the data collected via means of qualitative content analysis, they found that concurrent verbalization exposed actual textbook writing behaviors, logged instances of metacognitive awareness, and documented project reflections, and herein they frame TAPs as spaces abundant with opportunities to view reflexivity (reflective practice) and learning during open textbook production. The research evidences the various functions concurrent verbalization may serve in process-tracing studies of textbook writing and demonstrates that the method can be deployed in flexible ways to address research objectives and make progress on writing projects that demand considerable time and focus. It also explains the advantages of collecting TAP data over successive writing sessions to detect reflexivity during materials development. Plain Language Summary Thinking aloud as a Way to Prompt Reflection on Practice While Creating an Open Textbook Concurrent verbalization is a method that can be used to gather information about research participants’ thoughts as they carry out activities. During a concurrent verbalization session, a participant thinks aloud, and what they say is recorded so that it can be examined to address a study’s objectives. In the research project described in this paper, the authors used concurrent verbalization along with interviews to communicate their thoughts as they wrote an open (freely available) textbook for underprepared university students looking to improve their writing and study skills. They sought to track their writing processes in detail to increase understanding of how open textbooks are created since few such studies exist. So, while writing chapters, the inexperienced textbook authors audio recorded themselves thinking aloud and then looked for relationships amongst points mentioned in the recorded and transcribed material. Prominent in this material was the notion that concurrent verbalization played different roles during the textbook’s creation, and that is the research focus addressed here. In particular, the method brought to light how the authors behaved while writing, how they reacted to thinking aloud as they wrote, and how they remarked on textbook content already composed. In doing so, concurrent verbalization offered opportunities for exploration of and reflection on writing practices, as well as chances to learn from those activities. The paper emphasizes that concurrent verbalization can perform different functions in studies that track writing processes, can be used in flexible ways to fulfill research and writing project aims, and can encourage writers to reflect on their practices.

The present research provides a safe method for synthesizing iron oxide nanoparticles using leaf extract of  Parthenium hysterophorus . The novelty of the present study is the utilization of  P. hysterophorus  biomass as a reducing, capping, and stabilizing agent for the production of iron oxide nanoparticles with antifungal and antioxidant potential. The size, shape, crystalline nature, stability, functional groups, and purity of as-synthesized nanoparticles were analysed. Spherically shaped, with an average size of 17.5 nm, highly stable and crystalline  Parthenium -mediated iron oxide nanoparticles were produced. In addition, the antifungal activity was screened against fungal pathogens ( Aspergillus niger  and  A. flavus ) using well diffusion method. The growth of both funguses was inhibited by iron oxide nanoparticles. The antioxidant activity was performed by 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay. A higher concentration of iron oxide nanoparticles showed higher free radical scavenging activity compared to ascorbic acid. The IC 50  value was 184.3 µg/ml. The seed germination assay was performed using  Sesamum indicum  and  Arachis hypogaea.  A lower concentration of  Parthenium -mediated iron oxide nanoparticles, rather than higher ones, triggered the germination level.  Parthenium -mediated iron oxide nanoparticles may be used as nano-fungicide in biomedical and agricultural fields to improve human health and agriculture productivity.

In the context of climate change and the circular economy, biochar has recently found many applications in various sectors as a versatile and recycled material. Here, we review application of biochar-based for carbon sink, covering agronomy, animal farming, anaerobic digestion, composting, environmental remediation, construction, and energy storage. The ultimate storage reservoirs for biochar are soils, civil infrastructure, and landfills. Biochar-based fertilisers, which combine traditional fertilisers with biochar as a nutrient carrier, are promising in agronomy. The use of biochar as a feed additive for animals shows benefits in terms of animal growth, gut microbiota, reduced enteric methane production, egg yield, and endo-toxicant mitigation. Biochar enhances anaerobic digestion operations, primarily for biogas generation and upgrading, performance and sustainability, and the mitigation of inhibitory impurities. In composts, biochar controls the release of greenhouse gases and enhances microbial activity. Co-composted biochar improves soil properties and enhances crop productivity. Pristine and engineered biochar can also be employed for water and soil remediation to remove pollutants. In construction, biochar can be added to cement or asphalt, thus conferring structural and functional advantages. Incorporating biochar in biocomposites improves insulation, electromagnetic radiation protection and moisture control. Finally, synthesising biochar-based materials for energy storage applications requires additional functionalisation.

In recent decades, chemiresistive gas sensors (CGS) have been widely studied due to their unique advantages of expedient miniaturization, simple fabrication, easy operation, and low cost. As one ubiquitous interference factor, humidity dramatically affects the performance of CGS, which has been neglected for a long time. With the rapid development of technologies based on gas sensors, including the internet of things (IoT), healthcare, environment monitoring, and food quality assessing, the humidity interference on gas sensors has been attracting increasing attention. Inspiringly, various anti-humidity strategies have been proposed to alleviate the humidity interference in this field; however, comprehensive summaries of these strategies are rarely reported. Therefore, this review aims to summarize the latest research advances on humidity-independent CGS. First, we discussed the humidity interference mechanism on gas sensors. Then, the anti-humidity strategies mainly including surface engineering, physical isolation, working parameters modulation, humidity compensation, and developing novel gas-sensing materials were successively introduced in detail. Finally, challenges and perspectives of improving the humidity tolerance of gas sensors were proposed for future research.

This research focuses on the preparation of biodegradable composites of a polylactic acid (PLA) matrix reinforced with tricalcium phosphate (TCP) and zinc oxide (ZnO) nanoparticles for biomedical applications. Different concentrations of TCP and ZnO were used to prepare PLA/TCP, PLA/ZnO, and PLA/TCP/ZnO composites, and Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectra were measured to investigate their chemical compositions. The mechanical properties of the composites were tested, and their degradation behavior was examined in a phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) solution by monitoring the change in weight loss. The results showed that the addition of TCP improved the strength of the composite material, while ZnO improved its strength and ductility. The cumulative effect of TCP and ZnO nanoparticles in PLA can lead to a composite material with improved mechanical properties compared to pure PLA. The addition of TCP accelerates the decrease of the degradation rate of PLA and increases its mechanical strength, while the incorporation of ZnO can potentially accelerate degradation but also reinforce the mechanical properties. The novel PLA/30TCP/2ZnO composite showed optimum properties with a 51.47% increase in tensile strength, 42.62% increase in elongation at break, and 275.35% increase in degradation rate in terms of weight loss compared to pure PLA.

Free calcium oxide (f-CaO) in steel slag (SS) is considered to be the main reason for the volume expansion of steel slag, which has severely limited its application in cement or concrete. In this work, SS–cement pastes were prepared and hydrated under three different conditions. It was found that the hydration activity of f-CaO in steel slag and cement could be divided into three grades according to the hydration ratios under different hydration conditions. The high-activity f-CaO could undergo hydration reaction during the period of curing and would not participate in the expansion of hydration at a later stage. While the low-activity f-CaO would undergo hydration reaction during the boiling test and the lowest-activity f-CaO could not be hydrated except under autoclaving condition, both would participate in hydration expansion after the pastes hardened, thus leading to the poor volume stability of the pastes. Then, based on the fitting function of the experimental data and the extension of the mathematical model of hydration expansion, the contents of f-CaO with different activities in two kinds of SS were determined.

Research on graphite as anode material for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) has been carried out for a long time. Natural microcrystalline graphite (MG) with low cost and eco-friendly properties is a promising anode for LIBs. However, the tiny and irregular MG would cause serious side reactions with electrolytes and reduce the efficiency of energy storage. Here, the alkali fusion acid leaching method is employed for the purification of MG. After removing impurities, the purified MG is bound and wrapped by phenolic resin pyrolytic carbon to form secondary particles (PCG). Benefiting from the formation of secondary particles with a carbon shell, PCG exhibits a high specific capacity of 354.3 mAh/g and outstanding rate performance (82.7% capacity retention at 2 C). Meanwhile, outstanding cycling stability is demonstrated, with 92.7% capacity retention after 500 loops at 2 C. This research cleverly employs phenolic resin pyrolytic carbon to bind and wrap fragmented MG into secondary particles by a one-step method for high-performance LIBs anode. Such a “one stone two birds” strategy is cost-effective, environmentally friendly, and simple to operate, which is highly valuable for practical applications and provides a reference for the optimization of other graphite materials.