Energy management in 21st century: an inquiry into the mounting corporate hegemony over basic human necessities and the role of civil society as a countervailing force.

In 21st century, as energy and food supplies are increasingly becoming dependent on each other, any strategy to manage these two basic human needs should be formulated collectively –not in isolation. The ‘green revolution’ of 1950s paved the way for ascertaining corporate control on food and water. Through the enactment and subsequent ratification of Kyoto Protocol, the corporate hegemony on air and energy has been established firmly. During last hundred and fifty odd years, a symbiotic relationship between the state and large corporations was developed. The transnational corporations are trying to break away from such dependence on state and emerge as the dominant force to control and manage the global market. This study tries to explain the consequences of this changing relation between the ‘state’ and ‘corporations’ on the food and energy needs of the citizens. It also analyses various issues pertaining to the energy supplies during the next few decades of the 21st century. The paper concludes that in future, the civil society organizations (CSOs) will play an important role in steering the course of society especially in the allocation and distribution of basic human necessities like food and energy.Electricity retailing; food retailing, renewable energy; decentralized generation; civil society; multilateral organization; small and micro enterprise (sme), SMEs

S3S_3 symmetry and the quark mixing matrix

We impose an $S_3$ symmetry on the quark fields under which two of three quarks transform like a doublet and the remaining one as singlet, and use a scalar sector with the same structure of $SU(2)$ doublets. After gauge symmetry breaking, a $\mathbb{Z}_2$ subgroup of the $S_3$ remains unbroken. We show that this unbroken subgroup can explain the approximate block structure of the CKM matrix. By allowing soft breaking of the $S_3$ symmetry in the scalar sector, we show that one can generate the small elements, of quadratic or higher order in the Wolfenstein parametrization of the CKM matrix. We also predict the existence of exotic new scalars, with unconventional decay properties, which can be used to test our model experimentally.Comment: 7 pages, no figur

Estimation of collision centrality in terms of the number of participating nucleons in heavy-ion collisions using deep learning

The deep learning technique has been applied for the first time to investigate the possibility of centrality determination in terms of the number of participants ($N_{\mathrm{part}}$) in high-energy heavy-ion collisions. For this purpose, supervised learning using both deep neural network (DNN) and convolutional neural network (CNN) is performed with labeled data obtained by modeling relativistic heavy-ion collisions utilizing A Multi-phase Transport Model (AMPT). Event-by-event distributions of pseudorapidity and azimuthal angle of charged hadrons weighted by their transverse momentum are used as input to train the DL models. The DL models did remarkably well in predicting $N_{\mathrm{part}}$ values with CNN slightly outperforming the DNN model. The Mean Squared Logarithmic Error (MSLE) for the CNN model (Model-4) is determined to be 0.0592 for minimum bias collisions and 0.0114 for 0-60\% centrality class, indicating that the model performs better for semi-central and central collisions. Furthermore, the studied DL model is proven to be robust to changes in energy as well as model parameters of the input. The current study demonstrates that the data-driven technique has a distinct potential for determining centrality in terms of the number of participants in high-energy heavy-ion collision experiments.Comment: 13 pages, and 7 figure

Energy management in 21st century: an inquiry into the mounting corporate hegemony over basic human necessities and the role of civil society as a countervailing force.

In 21st century, as energy and food supplies are increasingly becoming dependent on each other, any strategy to manage these two basic human needs should be formulated collectively –not in isolation. The ‘green revolution’ of 1950s paved the way for ascertaining corporate control on food and water. Through the enactment and subsequent ratification of Kyoto Protocol, the corporate hegemony on air and energy has been established firmly. During last hundred and fifty odd years, a symbiotic relationship between the state and large corporations was developed. The transnational corporations are trying to break away from such dependence on state and emerge as the dominant force to control and manage the global market. This study tries to explain the consequences of this changing relation between the ‘state’ and ‘corporations’ on the food and energy needs of the citizens. It also analyses various issues pertaining to the energy supplies during the next few decades of the 21st century. The paper concludes that in future, the civil society organizations (CSOs) will play an important role in steering the course of society especially in the allocation and distribution of basic human necessities like food and energy

Domestic tourism of the urban Bengalis: A shared observation of the culture

The research reported in this paper attempts to give an overview of the culture concerning domestic tourism of the urban Bengalis, the linguistically distinct people of India. The urban Bengalis, especially the people of Kolkata metropolis are, since colonial period, one of the largest sections of the tourists in India. This paper is an exploration of relationship between the significant Bengali representations of travel and the contemporary preferences of urban Bengali domestic tourists. With that objective, the authors, being Bengali themselves, tried to encompass and analyse all the significantly popular Bengali representation in literature, films and other agencies centred on tourism and also the real experience of the purposively selected one hundred contemporary tourists from Bengali families living in Kolkata metropolis. The former is seen to prevail as the backdrop of the later, though the later is undergoing some shifts from the former vision. The observation shows that the decision-making for the domestic tours of the Bengalis depends on the locally understood criteria of preferences and the specific operation of the criteria as actively selected by the tourists. A current account of preferences of the informants is given in order to focus on the present trends of preferred domestic tours. The approach of the work ultimately explores the repertoire of the varied, but changing cultural motivation and representation of the tourists, the continuity and change in the trends of domestic tours of the Bengalis, and other relevant issues of the local internal tourism

A preliminary study on avifaunal species diversity of Maharaja Bir Bikram College campus, Tripura, North East India

Maharaja Bir Bikram College campus, Tripura is having a very good biodiversity having a different type of flora and fauna. The two big lakes and different types of flowering and fruit plants present in the campus provide grounds for feeding, breeding and nesting for avian fauna. The field survey was made to assess the campus avian faunal diversity by conducting weekly observations. Seventy six species of birds belonging to 42 families and 14 orders were recorded. Order Passeriformes contribute to about 42% of the total bird species richness. Of the total diversity, 51% birds are common, 22% are rare and 26% are abundant. Among the foraging groups, insectivores dominated the bird community

Comparative assessment of the antioxidant activity and free radical scavenging potential of different parts of Nerium indicum

Context: Reactive oxygen species (ROS) cause damage to cellular components. Antioxidant compounds scavenge or neutralize the ROS and thus have significant role in human health. Aims: The present study 70% methanol extracts of Nerium indicum leaf, stem and root were evaluated for in vitro total antioxidant, radical scavenging activity along with phenolic and flavonoid contents. Methods and Material: The extracts were examined for the scavenging activity of hydroxyl radical, nitric oxide, singlet oxygen, hypochlorous acid, superoxide, peroxynitrite, hydrogen peroxide. The extracts were also tested for their potential as an iron chelating agent, inhibition of lipid peroxidation and total reducing potential. Results: The present study indicates that the total antioxidant, DPPH (2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl) radical and singlet oxygen scavenging potential is in the order of stem>root>leaf. The hydroxyl radical scavenging, hydrogen peroxide scavenging and hypochlorous acid scavenging activity is in the order leaf>stem>root, whereas superoxide scavenging and lipid peroxidation inhibition assay is root>leaf>stem. Miscellaneous results were obtained in the scavenging of other radicals by the extracts, viz., leaf>root>stem for peroxynitrite and iron chelation activity, root>stem>leaf for reducing power and stem>leaf>root for nitric oxide inhibition. The phenolic and flavonoid content is in the following order root>stem>leaf and leaf>stem>root respectively. Conclusions: The present study revealed that the leaf, stem and root extracts of N. indicum are effective free radical scavenger and might be used as a natural source of potent antioxidant