Franchise A Live and Let Live Option for Public Transport Undertakings in India

Passenger road transport in India has thus far been predominantly under the domain of the public sector. The Road Transport Corporations Act, 1950, paved the way for the upsurge of nationalised bus transport in India. In some of the states in India, nationalisation was accomplished to an extent of 95% of all bus routes. And, these public transport undertakings have monopolistically grown in size with scant regard to efficiency or financial health, primarily due to lack of competition. However, in the ninetees, Indian public transport undertakings have been experiencing a drop in occupancy an onslaught by the ever increasing private operators fleet of maxi buses, mini buses & jeeps. Also, travel by jeeps seems to have become the travel style of the rural poor. The transport undertakings have no doubt built up their infrastructure for bus depots and workshops as well as for passenger amenities fairly well. But now, all such investments in these infrastructural assets, mobile assets and more importantly, in human assets, are proving to be a financial burden on them and these undertakings are incurring substantial financial losses. What then is the optimal mix of public and private fleet for a country like India? The author proposes franchise strategies to commercially exploit their built-up infrastructure based on the experiences of the largest bus operator in India which now faces intense competition from jeeps, maxicabs and buses.Institute of Transport and Logistics Studies. Faculty of Economics and Business. The University of Sydne

Isolation of Bacillus producing Chitinase from Soil: Production and Purification of Chito-oligosaccharides from Chitin Extracted from Fresh Water Crustaceans and Antimicrobial Activity of Chitinase

In the present investigation Bacillus sp. strain was isolated and screened from the red soil collected from Doiwala region of Dehradun (U.K), India. Serial dilution technique was adopted to isolate the organism and was screened for its chitinolytic activity. The biochemical tests were performed to prove its validity. The microorganism was also screened by inoculating a loop full of the isolated strain in basic cresol red dye and incubated for about 18- 24 h. The conversion of colour of the red dye into purple (pH, 6.5- 8.8) was taken as an indication for the presence of Bacillus sp. Amylase production by the organism was also screened by introduction of iodine in the broth/agar culture having starch. The broth/agar medium having starch but no bacterial strain was used as the control. The disappearance of color confirmed the presence of Bacillus strain producing amylase which degrades the starch. The chitinous wastes were collected from fresh water crustaceans viz. fresh water crab (Potamon sp.) and fresh water prawn (Palaemon sp.) and the chitin extracted was used as the substrate for chitinase. The yield of chitin extracted from fresh water prawn (Palaemon sp.) was found to be comparatively higher than that of chitin extracted from fresh water crab (Potamon sp.). Standard colloidal chitin was used as the reference control. The enzyme activity of chitinase for degradation of chitin extracted from crab and prawn was compared. The results confirmed that chitinase activity for degradation of crab chitin was comparatively higher than that of degradation of prawn chitin. The enzyme activities were found to be 0.11 µg/ml/minute and 0.09 µg/ml/minute for degradation of crab and prawn chitin respectively. The antimicrobial activity of chitinase extracted was determined against the bacterial and fungal cultures. Potent antibacterial activity of chitinase was observed against the bacterial cultures but no antifungal activity was observed. The chitinase produced by the species was able to degrade the chitin and chito-oligosaccharides produced was separated by TLC and purified by HPLC

Magnetocrystalline anisotropy in RAu_{2}Ge_{2} (R = La, Ce and Pr) single crystals

Anisotropic magnetic properties of single crystalline RAu_{2}Ge_{2} (R = La, Ce and Pr) compounds are reported. LaAu_{2}Ge_{2} exhibit a Pauli-paramagnetic behavior whereas CeAu_{2}Ge_{2} and PrAu_{2}Ge_{2} show an antiferromagnetic ordering with N\grave{e}el temperatures T_{N} = 13.5 and 9 K, respectively. The anisotropic magnetic response of Ce and Pr compounds establishes [001] as the easy axis of magnetization and a sharp spin-flip type metamagnetic transition is observed in the magnetic isotherms. The resistance and magnetoresistance behavior of these compounds, in particular LaAu_{2}Ge_{2}, indicate an anisotropic Fermi surface. The magnetoresistivity of CeAu_{2}Ge_{2} apparently reveals the presence of a residual Kondo interaction. A crystal electric field analysis of the anisotropic susceptibility in conjunction with the experimentally inferred Schottky heat capacity enables us to propose a crystal electric field level scheme for Ce and Pr compounds. For CeAu_{2}Ge_{2} our values are in excellent agreement with the previous reports on neutron diffraction. The heat capacity data in LaAu_{2}Ge_{2} show clearly the existence of Einstein contribution to the heat capacity.Comment: Submitted to PRB 11 Pages 13 Figure

Phonon anomalies at the valence transition of SmS : An inelasticX-ray scattering study under pressure

The phonon dispersion curve of SmS under pressure was studied by inelastic x-ray scattering around the pressure-induced valence transition. A significant softening of the longitudinal acoustic modes propagating along the [111] direction was observed spanning a wide $q$ region from ($\frac{2\pi}{3a},\frac{2\pi}{3a},\frac{2\pi}{3a}$) up to the zone boundary as SmS becomes metallic. The largest softening occurs at the zone boundary and stays stable up to the highest measured pressure of 80 kbar while a gradual hardening of the low $q$ modes simultaneously appears. This phonon spectrum indicates favorable conditions for the emergence of pressure-induced superconductivity in SmS.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Efficient Selfconsistent Calculations of Multiband Superconductivity in UPd2_2Al3_3

An efficient physically motivated computational approach to multiband superconductivity is introduced and applied to the study of the gap symmetry in a heavy-fermion, UPd$_2$Al$_3$. Using realistic pairing potentials and accurate energy bands that are computed within density functional theory, self-consistent calculations demonstrate that the only accessible superconducting gap with nodes exhibits d-wave symmetry in the $A_{1g}$ representation of the $D_{6h}$ point group. Our results suggest that in a superconductor with gap nodes the prevailing gap symmetry is dictated by the constraint that nodes must be as far as possible from high-density areas

An estimate of the flavour singlet contributions to the hyperfine splitting in charmonium

We explore the splitting between flavour singlet and non-singlet mesons in charmonium. This has implications for the hyperfine splitting in charmonium

High-rate low-temperature dc pulsed magnetron sputtering of photocatalytic TiO2films: the effect of repetition frequency

The article reports on low-temperature high-rate sputtering of hydrophilic transparent TiO2thin films using dc dual magnetron (DM) sputtering in Ar + O2mixture on unheated glass substrates. The DM was operated in a bipolar asymmetric mode and was equipped with Ti(99.5) targets of 50 mm in diameter. The substrate surface temperature Tsurfmeasured by a thermostrip was less than 180 °C for all experiments. The effect of the repetition frequency frwas investigated in detail. It was found that the increase of frfrom 100 to 350 kHz leads to (a) an improvement of the efficiency of the deposition process that results in a significant increase of the deposition rate aDof sputtered TiO2films and (b) a decrease of peak pulse voltage and sustaining of the magnetron discharge at higher target power densities. It was demonstrated that several hundreds nm thick hydrophilic TiO2films can be sputtered on unheated glass substrates at aD = 80 nm/min, Tsurf < 180 °C when high value of fr = 350 kHz was used. Properties of a thin hydrophilic TiO2film deposited on a polycarbonate substrate are given

The Dependence of the Superconducting Transition Temperature of Organic Molecular Crystals on Intrinsically Non-Magnetic Disorder: a Signature of either Unconventional Superconductivity or Novel Local Magnetic Moment Formation

We give a theoretical analysis of published experimental studies of the effects of impurities and disorder on the superconducting transition temperature, T_c, of the organic molecular crystals kappa-ET_2X and beta-ET_2X (where ET is bis(ethylenedithio)tetrathiafulvalene and X is an anion eg I_3). The Abrikosov-Gorkov (AG) formula describes the suppression of T_c both by magnetic impurities in singlet superconductors, including s-wave superconductors and by non-magnetic impurities in a non-s-wave superconductor. We show that various sources of disorder lead to the suppression of T_c as described by the AG formula. This is confirmed by the excellent fit to the data, the fact that these materials are in the clean limit and the excellent agreement between the value of the interlayer hopping integral, t_perp, calculated from this fit and the value of t_perp found from angular-dependant magnetoresistance and quantum oscillation experiments. If the disorder is, as seems most likely, non-magnetic then the pairing state cannot be s-wave. We show that the cooling rate dependence of the magnetisation is inconsistent with paramagnetic impurities. Triplet pairing is ruled out by several experiments. If the disorder is non-magnetic then this implies that l>=2, in which case Occam's razor suggests that d-wave pairing is realised. Given the proximity of these materials to an antiferromagnetic Mott transition, it is possible that the disorder leads to the formation of local magnetic moments via some novel mechanism. Thus we conclude that either kappa-ET_2X and beta-ET_2X are d-wave superconductors or else they display a novel mechanism for the formation of localised moments. We suggest systematic experiments to differentiate between these scenarios.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figure

Towards an international understanding of the power of celebrity persuasions: a review and a research agenda

Research into advertising using celebrity has been undertaken for nearly 40 years. It has principally used surveys and experiments to explore how consumers respond to celebrity advertisements. A recent meta-study of 32 papers has demonstrated that different populations respond in different ways to celebrity endorsements. Specifically, both US subjects and college students are more likely to respond in a significant way to the presence of celebrity than subjects who are not from the US, or who are not studying at college. Given that the nationality and student status of subjects matter, this article explores the make up of the samples that have been used to examine celebrity advertising. The article finds that these samples are not representative of US populations (because so many are students), nor of populations outside the US (because so few live beyond it). Furthermore, the history of dominance of US-based student samples, and the citation practices which keep them circulating in academia, suggests that theories of celebrity advertising have for a long time been excessively influenced by ideas tested on this unrepresentative group. This fact will limit the applicability of research into celebrity advertising to the wider world. I explore whether this matters, and how deficiencies might be addressed in further research