Search Results for: Research

The number of companies producing spent bleaching earth oil (SBEO) as a biofuel feedstock has been increasing, but despite the opportunities that new regulations and technologies offer, logistics, the lack of feedstock and costs remain major challenges.

That utilising bleaching earths and clays is a good idea is clear.…

The North American paint and coatings sector has been treading water as it struggles against flat demand and increasing regulatory burdens.

In the USA, the paint and coatings industry has faced declining sales volumes prompted by tailwinds in the construction sector.…

From formula composition and supply chain logistics to regulatory compliance, defect identification and corporate reputation, paint and coatings industry companies are exploring the growing potential of artificial intelligence (AI). 

With AI taking many different forms, key to the paint and coatings sector’s adoption of more widespread AI options are LLMs (large language models), such as ChatGPT, GPT-4, Llama 2 and Mistral 7B: “By using LLM you can easily allow users to interact with AI in a human-readable way instead of using code, as well as allowing AI to work with vast amounts of unstructured data which may be in various different formats,” London-based AI consultant Garuka Serasinghe who works with AI consultancy Futura, told PPCJ.  …

Ukrainian authorities, with the support of their European counterparts, are working to rid Ukraine of its former corrupt past – they are having mixed success. Dylan Carter reports.

While Ukraine battles an invading Russian enemy currently occupying approximately 18% of Ukrainian territory (1), it is also focused on its battle with the ‘enemy within’, namely elevated levels of corruption and other commercial crime.…

New digital and intelligent technologies are creating sweeping changes across the textile and clothing sector, with design being a particular focus of these innovations. Their goal is not to replace design brilliance, but rather to assist the inspiration and bring more popular designs to market in a cost-efficient way.…

Portuguese academic associations are warning that a majority of students are considering emigration after they complete their courses, because job opportunities on offer are to scant and poorly paid to secure a good living. 

Surveys by the Coimbra Academic Association of the University of Coimbra (founded in 1290) and the Porto Academic Federation (Federação Académica do Porto – FAP), a platform for all HE student associations in Portugal’s second city, released worrying data before the country’s March parliamentary elections.…

Food innovation centres (FICs) have become a feature of the global food production landscape over the past few decades and now play a significant role in the research and development of edible products.

The first purpose built FICs started to appear in the final quarter of the 20th century, with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in the US’s Midwest Corn Belt, an early mover in this field, opening its Food Processing Center in 1983 (1).…

Anti-fraud is all about catching and preventing swindles, but victims are increasingly banding together to launch class action lawsuits to secure compensation for past misdeeds.

The 2024 edition of the Duane Morris Class Action Review, from Philadelphia, USA-based law firm Duane Morris declares that 2023 was the second most prolific year for class action lawsuits in the world’s class action centre, America, (next to 2022), and anti-fraud class actions were particularly valuable for plaintiffs last year.…

The only university of the self-declared Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic, or Western Sahara, continues to teach and graduate students, despite the military stalemate that has persisted before and since its founding in 2012, which has left Morocco controlling 80% of the territory.…

The effectiveness of cross-border collaboration between national and international law enforcement agencies has been demonstrated by recent raids and arrests in the European Union (EU). The European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) in February (2024) and Swedish police worked with EU judicial agency Eurojust in February (2024) to breach a large-scale cross-border carousel VAT fraud.…