Custom copper smelters, dependent on purchased concentrates, face increasing economic pressures amid falling treatment and refining fees. With declining availability of high-grade, low-impurity concentrates, copper demand is expected to surge to support the transition to renewable energy. This study, based on recent observations of Chinese custom smelters, examines their strategies to address the challenge of purchasing concentrates at record-low treatment and refining charges. By investing in slag flotation technology, smelters can enhance copper, gold and silver recoveries. Through blending of high-grade and low-grade concentrates they can capitalize on the gap between the recoverable and payable metals, which is often referred to as “free metals”, while also benefiting from by-products, mainly sulfuric acid. While this approach offers economic opportunities, it introduces operational complexities. To mitigate these, laboratory testing combined with advanced digital predictive tools based on thermodynamics is crucial. This study demonstrates the use of thermodynamic models supported by experimental work for analyzing furnace operations. FactSage® software and a custom database are employed to define the operating window of two common flowsheets: 1) Flash Smelting + Flash Converting and 2) Bottom-Blown Smelting + Bottom Blowing Converting.

Copper anode slime (CAS) contains high concentrations of precious metals, particularly gold, which can reach up to 11 wt%. During copper anode electrorefining, 5-10 kg of CAS is generated per ton of copper cathode. Processing CAS is crucial for economic reasons, as gold significantly contributes to revenue for both miners and custom copper smelters. This paper provides a comprehensive review of industrial processes and technologies for CAS treatment, with a focus on gold recovery. It documents traditional and recent trends and analyzes the advantages and disadvantages of existing methods. Key factors affecting revenue, such as gold production lead time, in-process inventory, and first-pass recovery rate, are discussed to mitigate losses in fluctuating gold markets. CAS processing routes are categorized into two main groups: traditional hybrid routes (involving hydrometallurgy, pyrometallurgy, and electrorefining/electrowinning) and rather recent purely hydrometallurgical routes. Traditional methods can take up to 45 days, with gold recovery occurring late in the process and losses arising in anode, cathode, electrolyte, or slag. In contrast, purely hydrometallurgical routes have total processing times of 7-8 days, achieve early gold recovery, and can attain first-pass recovery rates as high as 99%. These findings indicate that purely hydrometallurgical routes outperform traditional hybrid methods. This paper aims to serve as a guideline for industrial CAS processing, assisting custom copper smelters in navigating challenging market conditions marked by low treatment and refining charges, with an emphasis on enhancing gold recovery to promote sustainability.

This contribution shows the possibilities of a low-cost multipurpose data logger that was built around an Arduino Mega 2560 single board computer. To transform the Arduino Mega into such a data logger, a sensor shield was designed that contains an SD-card, real-time clock, and different kinds of connectors so that sensors can easily be attached to the device. The software considers a wide range of predefined sensors from which a user can choose. To assess the performance of such a device, short-term monitoring campaigns in relation to outdoor air quality, human activity in an office, motion of a journey on a bike, and exhaust gas monitoring of a diesel generator were realized. Besides the possibilities to apply the data logger in different kinds of applications, a method is proposed to assess the credibility of such a system. The assessment based on the various short-term campaigns showed that the system scores positively on most of the performance indicators, but that unexpected (black swan) events affect the assessment over the longer term. This makes the development of low-cost scientific instruments harder than expected. The stability and long-term performance of this type of design requires continuous evaluation and engineering correction.

Software-In-The-Loop (SITL) simulation tools have been extensively used in development of safety-critical software. Utilizing these tools substantially accelerates software development eliminating potential risks and resource costs of physical experiments. This paper investigates the effects of model specific parameters on the development and testing of custom module in PX4 SITL environment. Models of a fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicle with vertical takeoff and landing capabilities and steerable sensor platform/gimbal are used as case study for this investigation. The effects of parameters of these aerial vehicle and sensor platform models are taken into consideration in the development of custom module that controls the dynamics of steerable sensor platform mounted on the vehicle model. The work also presents steps necessary to customize PX4 SITL and Gazebo simulation environment to incorporate parameters of the vehicle and sensor platform models in the development and testing process of custom module. Based on these instances, simulation results are obtained and discussed. The results show that reliability of PX4 SITL simulation framework is justified by proper customization and integration of PX4 SITL and Gazebo simulator.

High-Level Synthesis (HLS) tools have revolutionized FPGA application development by providing a more efficient and streamlined approach, significantly impacting digital design methodologies. Despite the capability of FPGAs to customize numerical representations in data paths, most HLS projects have focused on fixed-point precision, while floating-point representations remain limited to vendor-provided single, double, and half-precision formats. This paper proposes a customized floating-point library compatible with HLS to address these limitations. This library allows programmers to define the number of exponent and mantissa bits at compile time, providing greater flexibility and enabling the use of mixed precision. Moreover, this library includes optimized implementations of common components such as vector summation (VSUM), dot-product (DP), and matrix-vector multiplication (MVM). Results demonstrate that the proposed library reduces latency and resource utilization compared to vendor IP blocks, particularly in VSUM, DP, and MVM operations. For example, the MVM operation involving a 32x32 matrix, using vendor IP requires 22 clock cycles, whereas CuFP completes the same task in just 7 clock cycles, using approximately 60% fewer DSPs, 10% fewer LUTs, and 60% fewer FFs.

The article reports on a patient who required a cranial protection system.Using additive manufacturing techniques and surgical planning with the help of bio-models, a patient-specific bone implant solution was proposed that allows aesthetic restoration of the affected area and provides an adequate level of protection. In addition, through a comparative analysis with finite elements, the mechanical response to external actions of the medical device, printed with two materials: polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) and polyether-ether-ketone (PEEK), is simulated. The tested materials have recognized biocompatibility properties, but their costs on the market differ significantly. The results obtained demonstrate the similarities in the responses of both materials. It offers the possibility that low-income people can access these devices, guaranteeing adequate biomechanical safety, considering that PMMA is a much cheaper material than PEEK.

(1) Background: Pseudotumor of the hip is a sterile, non-neoplastic soft tissue mass associated with total hip arthroplasties. Pseudotumors may mimic soft tissue tumors, or infections, so the differential diagnosis is crucial and biopsy is recommended. The purpose of this study was to compare complications and functional results between one-stage and two-stage procedures. (2) Methods: We retrospectively analyzed 21 patients surgically treated at our Institution with “pseudotumor” associated with hip prosthesis (8 male,13 female; mean age 69 years). One-stage revision was performed in 10 cases, two-stage in 10, excision only in one case. Complications were classified as major and minor and functional results assessed using the Harris Hip Score (HHS). (3) Results: Five patients (24%) reported major complications. Survival rate to all com-plications was 75%. Overall survival was 95% at five years. Mean HHS went from 35 pre-operative to 75 post-operative, highlighting improved functional results in all cases. We rec-orded no differences in complications and functional outcome between one and two-stage proce-dures. (4) Conclusions: In our experience, two-stage surgical approach is preferable in cases with major bone defects and larger pseudotumor size. The use of custom-made 3D-printed prostheses is increasing and is a further reason to prefer two-stage revision.

An 8-months old male American Staffordshire terrier was referred for a no weightbearing lameness of the right pelvic limb, hyperthermia, lethargy and inappetence caused by hematogenous osteomyelitis. Orthopedic, radiographic and tomographic examinations revealed a bone sequestrum of 4 x 1.4 cm and active periosteal reaction of the caudo-lateral cortical in the metaphysis and the distal third of the right femoral diaphysis, medullary osteolysis and interruption of the cranio-medial cortical profile, with involvement of the femoral trochlea leading to a secondary medial patella luxation. Once skeletally mature, after 4 months from surgical debridement and aggressive antibiotic therapy against Klebsiella oxytoca revealed by bacteriological exam, the patient underwent prosthetic surgery for the application of a custom-made patellar groove replacement (PGR) to fill the bone defect and restore the femoral trochlea surface. Despite the serious injury that afflicted the right pelvic limb, the surgery had satisfactory outcomes until the last 18-months postoperative follow up.

AI is leveraging all aspects of life. Medical services are not untouched. Especially in the field of medical image processing and diagnosis. Big IT and Biotechnology companies are investing millions of dollars in medical and AI research. The recent outbreak of SARS COV-2 gave us a unique opportunity to study for a non interventional and sustainable AI solution. Lung disease remains a major healthcare challenge with high morbidity and mortality worldwide. The predominant lung disease was lung cancer. Until recently, the world has witnessed the global pandemic of COVID19, the Novel coronavirus outbreak. We have experienced how viral infection of lung and heart claimed thousands of lives worldwide. With the unprecedented advancement of Artificial Intelligence in recent years, Machine learning can be used to easily detect and classify medical imagery. It is much faster and most of the time more accurate than human radiologists. Once implemented, it is more cost-effective and time-saving. In our study, we evaluated the efficacy of Microsoft Cognitive Service to detect and classify COVID19 induced pneumonia from other Viral/Bacterial pneumonia based on X-Ray and CT images. We wanted to assess the implication and accuracy of the Automated ML-based Rapid Application Development (RAD) environment in the field of Medical Image diagnosis. This study will better equip us to respond with an ML-based diagnostic Decision Support System(DSS) for a Pandemic situation like COVID19. After optimization, the trained network achieved 96.8% Average Precision which was implemented as a Web Application for consumption. However, the same trained network did not perform like Web Application when ported to Smartphone for Real-time inference, which was our main interest of study. The authors believe, there is scope for further study on this issue. One of the main goals of this study was to develop and evaluate the performance of AI-powered Smartphone-based Real-time Applications. Facilitating primary diagnostic services in less equipped and understaffed rural healthcare centers of the world with unreliable internet service.

Background: The aim of the present investigation was to evaluate the clinical success of horizontal ridge augmentation in the severely atrophic maxilla (Cawood and Howell class IV) using freeze-dried custom made bone harvested from cadaver donors tibial hemiplateau and to analyze the marginal bone level gain prior dental implants placement at 9 months after bone grafting and before prosthetic rehabilitation. Methods: A 52-year-old woman received custom made bone grafts. Patient underwent CT scans 2 weeks prior and 9 months after surgery for graft volume and density analysis. Results: The clinical and radiographic bone observations showed a very low rate of resorption after bone graft and implant placement. Conclusions: The custom-made allograft material was a highly effective modality for restoring the alveolar horizontal ridge, resulting in this way to reduce the need to obtain autogenous bone from a secondary site with predictable procedure. Further studies are needed to investigate its behavior at longer time points.

The emergence of new methodologies and tools for digitizing objects belonging to the Cultural Heritage (CH) changed the paradigms adopted so far. Traditionally, the process to acquire artifacts required specialized and often costly equipment tailored to specific purposes. However, the development of more generalized, adaptable, and affordable tools led to novel approaches. This manuscript provides a glimpse into the evolving landscape of custom-made tools for digital documentation, both hardware and software, and their transformative impact on the digitization techniques, built to meet requirements of specific case studies, including ancient drawings, manuscripts, paintings, and museum objects. The advent of self-built instruments has revolutionized the way professionals work today, by leveraging a new generation of low-cost, adaptable gears, leading to unprecedented flexibility and efficiency, while facilitating the capture of high-quality digital representations of objects with minimal damage and preserving their integrity. The outcomes of instruments and tools specifically produced for the contexts described in this paper highlight their potential for promoting interdisciplinary collaboration, facilitating scholarly research, enhancing conservation efforts, and fostering cultural exchange. Ultimately, this research contributes to illustrate how custom software, in combination with recent devices such as smartphones and 3D printers, underscores the importance of adopting these innovative approaches to generate an ecosystem of tools and methods able to preserve, document, and promote the richness of our collective past for future generations.