Health, Fitness & Medical
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New Medicare open enrollment period runs Oct. 15-Dec. 7
Oct 15th
Boulder County, Colo. – The new Medicare open enrollment period begins today, Oct. 15 and runs through Dec. 7.
Open enrollment gives seniors a chance to make changes to their Part D (prescription drug) and Medicare Advantage plans.
These changes can only made during the open enrollment period.
“It is so important for seniors and caregivers to look at their plans every year, because plan costs and what they cover can change,” said Jan Van Sickle, Medicare Counselor for the Boulder County Area Agency on Aging.
The BCAAA is hosting free one-on-one counseling sessions throughout the county to help seniors choose the right plan. All sessions are by appointment and can be made by calling the session location directly:
- Boulder, 303-441-4388
- Lafayette, 303-665-9052
- Longmont, 303-651-8411
- Louisville, 303-666-7400
- Mountains, 303-441-1546
For more information, please call the BCAAA Medicare Counseling program line at 303-441-1546 or go to www.BoulderCountyMedicareHelp.org.
CU study: Graphene membranes may lead to enhanced natural gas production, less CO2 pollution
Oct 8th
The findings are a significant step toward the realization of more energy-efficient membranes for natural gas production and for reducing carbon dioxide emissions from power plant exhaust pipes.
Mechanical engineering professors Scott Bunch and John Pellegrino co-authored a paper in Nature Nanotechnology with graduate students Steven Koenig and Luda Wang detailing the experiments. The paper was published Oct. 7 in the journal’s online edition.
The research team introduced nanoscale pores into graphene sheets through ultraviolet light-induced oxidative “etching,” and then measured the permeability of various gases across the porous graphene membranes. Experiments were done with a range of gases including hydrogen, carbon dioxide, argon, nitrogen, methane and sulphur hexaflouride — which range in size from 0.29 to 0.49 nanometers — to demonstrate the potential for separation based on molecular size. One nanometer is one billionth of a meter.
“These atomically thin, porous graphene membranes represent a new class of ideal molecular sieves, where gas transport occurs through pores which have a thickness and diameter on the atomic scale,” said Bunch.
Graphene, a single layer of graphite, represents the first truly two-dimensional atomic crystal. It consists of a single layer of carbon atoms chemically bonded in a hexagonal “chicken wire” lattice — a unique atomic structure that gives it remarkable electrical, mechanical and thermal properties.
“The mechanical properties of this wonder material fascinate our group the most,” Bunch said. “It is the thinnest and strongest material in the world, as well as being impermeable to all standard gases.”
Those characteristics make graphene an ideal material for creating a separation membrane because it is durable and yet doesn’t require a lot of energy to push molecules through it, he said.
Other technical challenges will need to be overcome before the technology can be fully realized. For example, creating large enough sheets of graphene to perform separations on an industrial scale, and developing a process for producing precisely defined nanopores of the required sizes are areas that need further development. The CU-Boulder experiments were done on a relatively small scale.
The importance of graphene in the scientific world was illustrated by the 2010 Nobel Prize in physics that honored two scientists at Manchester University in England, Andre K. Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, for producing, isolating, identifying and characterizing graphene. Scientists see a myriad of potential for graphene as research progresses, from making new and better display screens and electric circuits to producing tiny biomedical devices.
The research was sponsored by the National Science Foundation; the Membrane Science, Engineering and Technology Center at CU-Boulder; and the DARPA Center on Nanoscale Science and Technology for Integrated Micro/Nano Electromechanical Transducers at CU-Boulder.
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Public hearing scheduled for Climate Change Preparedness Plan
Oct 6th
Boulder County, Colo. – The Boulder County Commissioners will hold a public hearing on the Climate Change Preparedness Plan developed earlier this year for the county in partnership with the City of Boulder.
When: Tuesday, Oct. 16 at 9 a.m.
Where: Boulder County Courthouse, third floor, 1325 Pearl St., Boulder
The draft plan was released for public comment in January and February and has since been revised in response to those comments and offered to the City of Boulder for review.
“This plan is an important step toward integrating our existing public health, emergency management and resource management plans in the context of the changing climate,” said Boulder County Sustainability Planner Lisa Friend. “Thanks to this process, we’ve identified where gaps might be in our planning – whether in disaster recovery, water resource management or educating vulnerable populations about extreme heat – and we’ve already begun to close them.”
The plan is available for review on the county’s Climate Change Preparedness Plan webpage (visit www.BoulderCounty.org and search “climate change plan”). For additional information, contact Lisa Friend at 303-441-3522 or lfriend@bouldercounty.org.