Advances in biological engineering are likely to have substantial impacts on global society. To explore these potential impacts we ran a horizon scanning exercise to capture a range of perspectives on the opportunities and risks presented by biological engineering. We first identified 70 potential issues, and then used an iterative process to prioritise 20 issues that we considered to be emerging, to have potential global impact, and to be relatively unknown outside the field of biological engineering. The issues identified may be of interest to researchers, businesses and policy makers in sectors such as health, energy, agriculture and the environment.
Persistent sciatic artery is a rare congenital anomaly with a high incidence rate of aneurysmal degeneration and risk of thromboembolization or rupture. Despite a number of recognized associations, the presence of coexistent venous anomalies is extremely rare. We present the case of a 27-year-old woman with atypical left-sided varicose veins and soft tissue hypertrophy. Imaging showed persistence of both sciatic artery and vein. Whether these anomalies are an incidental finding or represent a discrete clinical syndrome remains unclear. We emphasize that unusual distribution varicose veins may be associated with underlying persistent sciatic vessels and recommend formal duplex scan assessment for these anomalies.
Horizon scanning is intended to identify the opportunities and threats associated with technological, regulatory and social change. In 2017 some of the present authors conducted a horizon scan for bioengineering (Wintle et al., 2017). Here we report the results of a new horizon scan that is based on inputs from a larger and more international group of 38 participants. The final list of 20 issues includes topics spanning from the political (the regulation of genomic data, increased philanthropic funding and malicious uses of neurochemicals) to the environmental (crops for changing climates and agricultural gene drives). The early identification of such issues is relevant to researchers, policy-makers and the wider public.
N‐substituted polycarbamates of relatively low molecular weight have been prepared from the condensation of 1,6‐hexanebischloroformate with N‐substituted diamines, both aliphatic and aromatic. The initial rates of thermal degradation of these polymers and of unsubstituted analogs have been determined at 230–285°C. by following the evolution of carbon dioxide. The results showed that the more thermally stable polymers were those derived from the substituted aliphatic diamines, having the formula [N(R)XN(R)COO(CH2)6OCO]n where X is (CH2)5 or (CH2)6. When R was CH3 and C6H5, the overall EA was 31 and 46 kcal./mole, respectively. The polymers derived from aromatic diamines, where X was 4,′ 4‐C6H4CH2C6H4, showed low values for EA, approximately 15 kcal./mole, regardless of whether R was H or alkyl. This low thermal stability was shown to be caused by amine endgroups. Some evidence as to modes of thermal degradation was obtained from a study of volatile products.
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