Giant Magnetoimpedance (GMI) Effect and Field Sensitivity of Ferrofluid Coated Co66Fe2Si13B15Cr4 Soft Magnetic Amorphous Microwire

AbstractCo66Fe2Si13B15Cr4 based amorphous microwire was developed at the laboratory using in-water quenching apparatus. The field sensitivity of the wire was enhanced when coated with ferrofluids. The presence of coating also decreased the frequency of the magnetising field 5MHz to 1MHz at which the maximum GMI ratio observed

Analysis on effect of shapes for microwave-assisted food processing of 2D samples

Paper presented to the 10th International Conference on Heat Transfer, Fluid Mechanics and Thermodynamics, Florida, 14-16 July 2014.Present work provides guidelines on forecasting heating patterns in microwave processed foods which influence their final properties and quality. Three different cross-sections with equal area have been considered, namely, circular, square (indicated as Type1) and square inclined at an angle of 45° with horizontal plane (indicated as Type 2). Have been assumed to be exposed to lateral and radially incident microwaves. Microwave power absorption within samples have been studied using dimensionless parameters, viz. (i) Nw: represents the effect of sample size on power absorption. (ii) fp and fw: represents the effect of dielectric properties on power absorption Food materials were classified into 4 Groups with their fp, fw, as low fp and low fw (Group 1), low fp and high fw (Group 2), high fp and low fw (Group 3), high fp and high fw (Group 4), where low fp (fw) represents fp (fw)<0.3, while high fp (fw) represents fp (fw)_0.3. Power and temperature profiles have been studied in representative materials from each Group. It is found that power absorption profiles for all groups of food and for all the shapes of circular, Type 1 and Type 2 occur in three regime in increasing order of sample size, i.e (i) thin regime: characterized by uniform power absorption (ii) intermediate regime: resonances in absorbed power and (iii) thick regime: exponential attenuation of power within sample. It is also found that, in general identical areas of all the three shapes give rise to identical power absorption at any given sample dimension. Formation and location of hot-spots within material is found to be dependent on the type of incidence, sample dimensions and cross-section of material.dc201

Theoretical prediction and experimental study of a ferromagnetic shape memory alloy: Ga_2MnNi

We predict the existence of a new ferromagnetic shape memory alloy Ga_2MnNi using density functional theory. The martensitic start temperature (T_M) is found to be approximately proportional to the stabilization energy of the martensitic phase (deltaE_tot) for different shape memory alloys. Experimental studies performed to verify the theoretical results show that Ga_2MnNi is ferromagnetic at room temperature and the T_M and T_C are 780K and 330K, respectively. Both from theory and experiment, the martensitic transition is found to be volume conserving that is indicative of shape memory behavior.Comment: 11 pages, 3 figure

Mathematical Modelling of Seperation Behaviour of a Spiral for Washing high ash Coal

Sustained Coal R&D activity has been crucial to the many successful clean coal technology developments that have been achieved globally. The aim has been to enhance the competitiveness of coal by providing technical and envir-onmental improvements whilst at the same time reducing capital and operating costs. In coal preparation, simpler lower cost alternatives to froth flotation, such as the coal dense medium separator and spiral separators, have been adapted for cleaning of fine coal. A mathematical model has been developed to characterize the separation behavior of a typical high ash coal in a spiral. The modeling framework consists of parametric representation of geometry of the spiral and its trough, particulate flow along the helical path and principal forces acting on a particle during its motion. The elements have been combined seamlessly by assuming that the particles event-ually attain dynamic equilibrium in the forward longitu-dinal direction and static equilibrium in the transverse direction. The resulting force function provides a spect-rum of the particles' radial location on the trough according to their size and relative specific gravity. The model predicts relative specific gravity distribution and particle size as a function of equilibrium radial posi-tion. Sensitivities of radial equilibrium distribution of particle size and relative specific gravity with respect to mean flow depth have also been investigated. Simulation results are encouraging and validated with the published data. The model provides an analytical tool for better understanding of the separation behavior of particles in a coal-washing spiral

ZipA Binds to FtsZ with High Affinity and Enhances the Stability of FtsZ Protofilaments

A bacterial membrane protein ZipA that tethers FtsZ to the membrane is known to promote FtsZ assembly. In this study, the binding of ZipA to FtsZ was monitored using fluorescence spectroscopy. ZipA was found to bind to FtsZ with high affinities at three different (6.0, 6.8 and 8.0) pHs, albeit the binding affinity decreased with increasing pH. Further, thick bundles of FtsZ protofilaments were observed in the presence of ZipA under the pH conditions used in this study indicating that ZipA can promote FtsZ assembly and stabilize FtsZ polymers under unfavorable conditions. Bis-ANS, a hydrophobic probe, decreased the interaction of FtsZ and ZipA indicating that the interaction between FtsZ and ZipA is hydrophobic in nature. ZipA prevented the dilution induced disassembly of FtsZ polymers suggesting that it stabilizes FtsZ protofilaments. Fluorescein isothiocyanate-labeled ZipA was found to be uniformly distributed along the length of the FtsZ protofilaments indicating that ZipA stabilizes FtsZ protofilaments by cross-linking them

HIV Transmission Potential Among Local and Migrant Factory Workers in Kolkata, India

Migrant workers in India play a key role in the spread of HIV. Kolkata is a common destination for workers, who may acquire infection and transmit it to their wives and/or other sexual partners. We investigated sexual relations and condom use by factory workers. Migrant and local factory workers were randomly selected from five wards of Kolkata. Information was collected about demographic and socio-economic characteristics, sexual relationships, condom usage, and perceptions and intent to use condoms. Condom use was very low in both groups of workers, particularly among migrants. Many married workers visited female sex workers but never used condoms. Few intended to use condoms, and if they did, it did not always translate into actual usage. There is great potential for transmission of HIV/sexually transmitted infections by these workers. Carefully designed intervention and education programs in the context of low literacy and cultural norms are urgently needed

A general modeling and visualization tool for comparing different members of a group: application to studying tau-mediated regulation of microtubule dynamics

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Innumerable biological investigations require comparing collections of molecules, cells or organisms to one another with respect to one or more of their properties. Almost all of these comparisons are performed manually, which can be susceptible to inadvertent bias as well as miss subtle effects. The development and application of computer-assisted analytical and interpretive tools could help address these issues and thereby dramatically improve these investigations.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>We have developed novel computer-assisted analytical and interpretive tools and applied them to recent studies examining the ability of 3-repeat and 4-repeat tau to regulate the dynamic behavior of microtubules in vitro. More specifically, we have developed an automated and objective method to define growth, shortening and attenuation events from real time videos of dynamic microtubules, and demonstrated its validity by comparing it to manually assessed data. Additionally, we have used the same data to develop a general strategy of building different models of interest, computing appropriate dissimilarity functions to compare them, and embedding them on a two-dimensional plot for visualization and easy comparison. Application of these methods to assess microtubule growth rates and growth rate distributions established the validity of the embedding procedure and revealed non-linearity in the relationship between the tau:tubulin molar ratio and growth rate distribution.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This work addresses the need of the biological community for rigorously quantitative and generally applicable computational tools for comparative studies. The two-dimensional embedding method retains the inherent structure of the data, and yet markedly simplifies comparison between models and parameters of different samples. Most notably, even in cases where numerous parameters exist by which to compare the different samples, our embedding procedure provides a generally applicable computational strategy to detect subtle relationships between different molecules or conditions that might otherwise escape manual analyses.</p