Solar wind helium, neon and argon released by oxidation of metal grains from the Weston chondrite

A set of experiments were carried out to test the feasibility of determining unfractionated elemental and isotopic ratios for the noble gases in the presumably ancient solar wind present in the gas rich meteorites. The problems of diffusive loss was avoided by analyzing metal rather than the usual silicates. In order to avoid chemical, and even harsh physical, treatment of the sample, which might have affected the surfaces of metal grains, a means of analyzing the metal in the presence of residual silicate not removed by gentle crushing and magnetic separation was devised. Preliminary results given were obtained by taking advantage of the differing properties of metal and silicates with regard to diffusion. The results suggests that, with some modifications in the choice of pyrolysis and combustion temperatures and in the amount of O2 used, it should be possible, by oxidizing the surfaces of metal grains from gas rich meteorites, to obtain data on solar wind that has not been fractionated by diffusive loss

Studies on the Accumulation of Chromium in Fenugreek

Studying Cr uptake by Fenugreek, we note that the maximum concentration of Cr takes place in the shells of the pods followed by leaves, stems and seeds in that order. Interestingly, applied higher doses of Cr does not increase accumulation of Cr in the stems, rather Cr content in the stems levels off. However, the maximum dispersal/distribution of Cr taken up is in the leaves

Chromium uptake by Fenugreek

Fenugreek (Trigonella foenum- graecum) is both herb (leaves) and a spice (seed) belonging to the family Fabaceae. Fenugreek leaves and seeds are used in the cuisine of India. Fenugreek also has medicinal value. Fenugreek seeds are known to reduce serum glucose and improve glucose tolerance and hence are prescribed to diabetic patients. In the recent past supplemental Chromium is being prescribed to diabetic patients to activate (increased- insulin binding, insulin receptor number, insulin receptor phosphorylation) insulin. Plants can uptake substantial quantities of toxic metals from contaminated soils if these soils are well ameliorated. 

It is then probable that the medicinal efficacy of Fenugreek in the case of diabetes could be enhanced if it takes up chromium from the soil. Preliminary studies are being conducted to note the chromium uptake by Fenugreek from soils which are applied with potassium dichromate

Occurrence of a rare species of red crab, Ranina ranina (Linnaeus 1758) along Chennai coast

The red frog crab otherwise called spanner crab is a coastal water species and single representative of genus Ranina under family Raninidea. They prefer to inhabit in bare sandy areas of intertidal and coastal waters of more than 100m depth. Distribution of this crab is confined to tropical and sub topical coastal waters of Indian and Pacific oceans, from the coast of South Africa to Hawaii and the Great Barrier Reef. Occurrence of this species is very sparse in Indian waters and has been recorded once in Gulf of Mannar (Kasinathan et al., 2007)

Rare occurrence of deepsea snake mackerel off Nagapattinam coast in the Bay of Bengal

Lepidocybium flavobrunneum (Smith, 1843) has a wide distribution in tropical and temperate seas of the world. The species is considered to be benthopelagic in occurrence between 200 and 1000 m, depth, and probably not reported to occur in the northern Indian Ocean. Balasubramanian (2007) reported on the occurrence of this species during 2004-06 in the landings of large meshed gillnets operated off Tuticorin coast in the Gulf of Mannar. A catch of 4 specimens of Lepidocybium flavobrunneum (Fig. 1) belonging to the family Gempylidae (snake mackerels) were observed at Chennai Fisheries Harbour on 5.3.2009

Lunar sample analysis

Results are presented from an extensive series of new high resolution scanning electron microscope studies of the very primative group of meteorites known as unequilibrated chondrites. These include quantitative analyses of micrometer sized phases and interpretation in terms of relevant phase equilibria. Several new meteorite minerals including high chromium metal, have been discovered

Semiring arising as Lattice of Groupsemirings

Much study has been done on semigroups which are unions of groups. There are several ways in which a union of groups can be made into a semigroup in which each of the component groups arises as subgroups of the constructed semigroup. An important class of such unions is a semilattice of groups. Group semirings are semirings $(G,+,\cdot )$ where $(G,\cdot )$ is a group and $(G,+)$ is a left zero semigroup. We consider construction of semirings from classes of group semirings $\{G_\alpha :\alpha\in D \}$ indexed by a distributive lattice $D$. It is shown that if $S=\cup\{G_\alpha \}$ is a strong distributive lattice of group semirings $G_\alpha$ then the multiplicative semigroup $(S,\cdot)$ of the semiring $(S,+,\cdot)$ is a Clifford semigroup and the additive semigroup $(S,+)$ is a left normal band. Further in this case all the groups $G_\alpha$ are mutually isomorphic