On the survivability and detectability of terrestrial meteorites on the moon

Materials blasted into space from the surface of early Earth may preserve a unique record of our planet's early surface environment. Armstrong et al. (2002) pointed out that such materials, in the form of terrestrial meteorites, may exist on the Moon and be of considerable astrobiological interest if biomarkers from early Earth are preserved within them. Here, we report results obtained via the AUTODYN hydrocode to calculate the peak pressures within terrestrial meteorites on the lunar surface to assess their likelihood of surviving the impact. Our results confirm the order-of-magnitude estimates of Armstrong et al. (2002) that substantial survivability is to be expected, especially in the case of relatively low velocity (ca. 2.5 km/s) or oblique (≤45°) impacts, or both. We outline possible mechanisms for locating such materials on the Moon and conclude that searching for them would be a scientifically valuable activity for future lunar exploration

Ferulic acid: A novel inducer of antioxidant enzymes in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) seedlings

The present study reports the effects of pre-treatment with ferulic acid (FA) on antioxidant response of wheat seedlings. In comparison to hydropriming, 100 and 150 ppm of FA significantly enhanced seedling growth of wheat at 6th day after germination (DAG). However, 1000 ppm of FA led to reduction in seedling growth. Roots and shoots of wheat seedlings pre-treated with 100 ppm of FA showed significant upregulation of peroxidase (POX), ascorbate peroxidase (APX) activities. Although catalase (CAT) remained unaffected in the roots, but showed about 2-fold increase in the shoots. Despite of low glutathione reductase (GR) and high polyphenol oxidase (PPO) activities in the shoots and roots, respectively, ascorbic acid and total phenolic contents also increased at 6th DAG which may be due to the activation of their biosynthetic pathways in seedlings pre-treated with 100 ppm of FA. Proline content of wheat seedlings pre-treated with 100 ppm of FA remained unaffected. Results signify the role of FA pre-treatment in augmenting the antioxidant response of wheat and thereby suggest that at lower concentrations, it can be used for improving performance of wheat under various environmental constraints

Development of Reservoir Characterization Techniques and Production Models for Exploiting Naturally Fractured Reservoirs

This report focuses on integrating geoscience and engineering data to develop a consistent characterization of the naturally fractured reservoirs. During this reporting period, effort was focused on relating seismic data to reservoir properties of naturally fractured reservoirs, scaling well log data to generate interwell descriptors of these reservoirs, enhancing and debugging a naturally fractured reservoir simulator, and developing a horizontal wellbore model for use in the simulator

Human-Machine Interface for Tele-Robotic Operation: Mapping of Tongue Movements Based on Aural Flow Monitoring

2004 IEEE International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems (IROS), October, 2004 (Awarded “Best Paper in Conference”

Does the QCD plasma contain propagating gluons?

Comparison of two appropriately chosen screening masses of colour singlet operators in the pure glue QCD plasma indicates that at sufficiently high temperature it contains a weakly-interacting massive quasi-particle with the quantum numbers of the electric gluon. Still in the deconfined phase, but closer to T_c, the same mass ratio is similar to that at zero temperature, indicating that the propagating modes are more glueball-like, albeit with a lower scale for the masses. We observe a continuity between these two regimes.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

On the fourth-order accurate compact ADI scheme for solving the unsteady Nonlinear Coupled Burgers' Equations

The two-dimensional unsteady coupled Burgers' equations with moderate to severe gradients, are solved numerically using higher-order accurate finite difference schemes; namely the fourth-order accurate compact ADI scheme, and the fourth-order accurate Du Fort Frankel scheme. The question of numerical stability and convergence are presented. Comparisons are made between the present schemes in terms of accuracy and computational efficiency for solving problems with severe internal and boundary gradients. The present study shows that the fourth-order compact ADI scheme is stable and efficient

Real and imaginary chemical potential in 2-color QCD

In this paper we study the finite temperature SU(2) gauge theory with staggered fermions for non-zero imaginary and real chemical potential. The method of analytical continuation of Monte Carlo results from imaginary to real chemical potential is tested by comparison with simulations performed {\em directly} for real chemical potential. We discuss the applicability of the method in the different regions of the phase diagram in the temperature -- imaginary chemical potential plane.Comment: 15 pages, 7 figures; a few comments added; version published on Phys. Rev.

Natural Theories of Ultra-Low Mass PNGB's: Axions and Quintessence

We consider the Wilson Line PNGB which arises in a U(1)^N gauge theory, abstracted from a latticized, periodically compactified extra dimension U(1). Planck scale breaking of the PNGB's global symmetry is suppressed, providing natural candidates for the axion and quintessence. We construct an explicit model in which the axion may be viewed as the 5th component of the U(1)_Y gauge field in a 1+4 latticized periodically compactified extra dimension. We also construct a quintessence PNGB model where the ultra-low mass arises from Planck-scale suppressed physics itself.Comment: 20 pages, fixed typo and reference

Detonating Cord for Flux Compression Generation using Electrical Detonator No. 33

The paper highlights the use of electrical detonators for magnetic flux compression generator applications which requires synchronisation of two events with precise time delay of tens of ms and jitter within a few ms. These requirements are generally achieved by exploding bridge wire type detonators which are difficult to develop and are not commercially available. A technique has been developed using commercially available electrical detonator no. 33 to synchronise between peak of seed current in stator coil and detonation of explosive charge in armature. In present experiments, electrical signal generated by self-shorting pin due to bursting of electrical detonator has been used to trigger the capacitor discharge and the detonating cord of known length has been used to incorporate predetermined delay to synchronise the events. It has been demonstrated that using electrical detonator and known length of detonating cord, the two events can be synchronised with predetermined delay between 31 and 251 ms with variation of ± 0.5ms. The technique developed is suitable for defence applications like generation of high power microwaves using explosive driven magnetic flux compression generators.Defence Science Journal, 2011, 61(1), pp.19-24, DOI:http://dx.doi.org/10.14429/dsj.61.3

Genetic determinants of cellular addiction to DNA polymerase theta

Polymerase theta (Pol θ, gene name Polq) is a widely conserved DNA polymerase that mediates a microhomology-mediated, error-prone, double strand break (DSB) repair pathway, referred to as Theta Mediated End Joining (TMEJ). Cells with homologous recombination deficiency are reliant on TMEJ for DSB repair. It is unknown whether deficiencies in other components of the DNA damage response (DDR) also result in Pol θ addiction. Here we use a CRISPR genetic screen to uncover 140 Polq synthetic lethal (PolqSL) genes, the majority of which were previously unknown. Functional analyses indicate that Pol θ/TMEJ addiction is associated with increased levels of replication-associated DSBs, regardless of the initial source of damage. We further demonstrate that approximately 30% of TCGA breast cancers have genetic alterations in PolqSL genes and exhibit genomic scars of Pol θ/TMEJ hyperactivity, thereby substantially expanding the subset of human cancers for which Pol θ inhibition represents a promising therapeutic strategy