Developing an environmental friendly approach for enhancing water retention with the amendment of water-absorbing polymer and fertilizers

The effect of climate/environmental change has resulted in adverse water stress conditions which necessitates the sustainable approaches for improving the water use efficiency to boost agricultural production in Central Asia. Water-absorbing polymer (WAP) has emerged as one of the amendments for soil water stress management. WAP are chemically cross-linked structure capable of absorbing and storing a large amount of water. The agricultural land has different levels of fertilizers which can influence the performance of WAP because of its sensitivity due to external ionic medium. Therefore, the combined or hybrid use of WAP and organic/ inorganic fertilizers may inhibit the functionality of WAP, which needs to be thoroughly investigated. This study demonstrates the performance of two different WAPs (a commercially WAP (crosslinked potassium polyacrylate) and a laboratory synthesized WAP (crosslinked fly ash-polyacrylate superabsorbent composite)) with varying combinations of fertilizers in silt loam (agrarian soil). The combined use of fertilizers and WAP have improved the water retention properties of soils due to modification in the soil pore volume for both the WAPs. Quantification from water retention properties revealed a significant increase in plant wilting time (PWT) and plant available water content (PAWC) under the combined influence of fertilizers and WAP amended soils, indicating the possibility of high-water availability to plant roots. The study suggests the potential of WAPs as an efficient soil conditioner even in the presence of fertilizer for countering the negative impacts of water stress conditions. WAPs might minimize the requirement for chemical fertilizers, which helps to enhance the climate/environmental change and agriculture sector in the Central Asian region

Spontaneous aminolytic cyclization and self-assembly of dipeptide methyl esters in water

Dipeptides are known to spontaneously cyclize to diketopiperazines, and in some cases these cyclic dipeptides have been shown to self-assemble to form supramolecular nanostructures. Herein, we demonstrate the in situ cyclization of dipeptide methyl esters in aqueous buffer by intramolecular aminolysis, leading to the formation of diverse supramolecular nanostructures. The chemical nature of the amino acid side chains dictates the supramolecular arrangement and resulting nanoscale architectures. For c[LF], supramolecular gels are formed, and the concentration of starting materials influences the mechanical properties of hydrogels. Moreover, by adding metalloporphyrin to the starting dipeptide ester solution, these become incorporated through cooperative assembly, resulting in the formation of nanofibers able to catalyse the oxidation of organic phenol in water. The approach taken here, which combines the chemically activated assembly with the versatility of short peptides might pave the way for achieving the spontaneous formation of supramolecular order and function using simple building blocks

Growth dynamics of deciduous species during their life period: A case study of urban green space in India

It is evident that grass density (GD) and shoot growth rate (SGR) governs the differential settlement of substructure, groundwater recharge, and stability of green infrastructure. GD and SGR are usually assumed to be constant during the entire life period of vegetation. However, spatial and temporal dynamics of GD and SGR in urban green space were rarely explored previously. The main objective of this study is to explore the spatial and temporal dynamics of GD and SGR in urban space vegetated with deciduous species (mix grass i.e., Poaceae and Bauhinia purpurea). Field monitoring was conducted in the urban green space for one year (i.e., life period of selected species). The monitoring period includes the growth period and gradual wilting period. Substantial spatial variation of GD was found during the first six months. GD away from the tree trunk was found to be 1.02–56.3 times higher than that near the tree trunk during the first six months. Thereafter, any spatial variation of GD was not found in the next six months. Unlike the GD, SGR was found to vary during the entire life period of mix grass. In addition, SGR away from the tree trunk was found to be 1.1–4.6 times higher than that near the tree trunk. Any relationship between GD and rainfall depth was not found. Whereas, SGR mainly depends on rainfall depth. The hypothesis of uniformity in GD and SGR during the life period of deciduous species was not found to be true

Dynamics of Hot QCD Matter -- Current Status and Developments

The discovery and characterization of hot and dense QCD matter, known as Quark Gluon Plasma (QGP), remains the most international collaborative effort and synergy between theorists and experimentalists in modern nuclear physics to date. The experimentalists around the world not only collect an unprecedented amount of data in heavy-ion collisions, at Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC), at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) in New York, USA, and the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), at CERN in Geneva, Switzerland but also analyze these data to unravel the mystery of this new phase of matter that filled a few microseconds old universe, just after the Big Bang. In the meantime, advancements in theoretical works and computing capability extend our wisdom about the hot-dense QCD matter and its dynamics through mathematical equations. The exchange of ideas between experimentalists and theoreticians is crucial for the progress of our knowledge. The motivation of this first conference named "HOT QCD Matter 2022" is to bring the community together to have a discourse on this topic. In this article, there are 36 sections discussing various topics in the field of relativistic heavy-ion collisions and related phenomena that cover a snapshot of the current experimental observations and theoretical progress. This article begins with the theoretical overview of relativistic spin-hydrodynamics in the presence of the external magnetic field, followed by the Lattice QCD results on heavy quarks in QGP, and finally, it ends with an overview of experiment results.Comment: Compilation of the contributions (148 pages) as presented in the `Hot QCD Matter 2022 conference', held from May 12 to 14, 2022, jointly organized by IIT Goa & Goa University, Goa, Indi

Graphene-oxide coating for corrosion protection of iron particles in saline water

The corrosion resistance behavior of graphene oxide (GO) sheets-coated carbonyl iron (CI) microspheres (GO/p-CI sample) was investigated and compared with that of bare CI particles. The GO coating on the CI particles was achieved by utilizing 4-aminobenzoic acid as grafting agent. The cyclic voltammetry of the electrode containing this GO/p-CI sample in 1 mol/L KCI solution does not show any oxidation-peak in contrast to that of the bare carbonyl iron (CI) containing electrode. The charge transfer resistance of GO/p-CI sample was measured to be higher than that of bare Cl. The corrosion-potential shifts towards the positive potential direction confirming higher passivity/less corrosive nature of the GO/p-CI sample. Furthermore, the corrosion-current of GO/p-CI sample was lower than that of the bare CI particles. Our results confirm the passivity and excellent corrosion protection behavior of the GO coating on iron structures. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved

Rashba spin-orbit interaction induced modulation of magnetic anisotropy

In past few decades, Rashba spin-orbit coupling (SOC) has been successfully employed for the emergence of exotic phenomena at the quantum oxide interfaces. In these systems, the combined effect of charge transfer, broken symmetries and SOC yields intriguing interfacial magnetism and transport properties. Here, we provide an insight to control and tune interfacial phenomena in CaMnO3/CaIrO3 based 3d-5d oxide heterostructures by the charge transfer driven Rashba SOC. Anomalous Hall effect in these canted antiferromagnetic heterostructures originates from the intrinsic contribution associated with the topology of the electronic band structure and it is mostly confined to the interface. Rashba SOC reconstructs the Berry curvature and enhances the anomalous Hall conductivity by two orders of magnitude. From the anisotropy magnetoresistance measurements we demonstrate that Rashba SOC is instrumental in tailoring magnetic anisotropy where magnetization easy-axis rotates from the out-of-plane direction to the in-plane direction. The ability to tune Rashba SOC and resulting competing magnetic anisotropy provides a route to manipulate electronic band structure for the origin of non-trivial spin texture useful for spin-orbitronics applications