Pioneering Metallurgy: The origins of iron and steel making in the Southern Indian subcontinent Telangana Field Survey Interim Report 2011

A chapter from this report ("From the macroscopic to the microscopic: some scientific insights") is in ORE: http://hdl.handle.net/10871/17744British Council UKIER

From the macroscopic to the microscopic: some scientific insights

The full report in which this chapter appears is in ORE: http://hdl.handle.net/10871/1416

The significance of wootz steel to the history of materials science

The melting of steel proved to be a challenge in antiquity on account of the high melting point of iron. In the 1740s Benjamin Huntsman successfully developed a technique of producing steel that allowed it to be made on a much larger commercial scale and was credited with the discovery of crucible steel. However, Cyril Stanley Smith brought to wider attention an older tradition of crucible steel from India, i.e. wootz or Damascus steel, which he hailed as one of the four metallurgical achievements of antiquity. Known by its anglicized name, wootz from India has attracted world attention. Not so well known is the fact that the modern edifice of metallurgy and materials science was built on European efforts to unravel the mystery of this steel over the past three centuries

Minerals and metals heritage of India (NIAS Backgrounder No. B8-2013)

The minerals and metals heritage of India covers a period of over ten thousand years and extends beyond the current national boundaries of the Republic of India

Towards AI enabled automated tracking of multiple boxers

Continuous tracking of boxers across multiple training sessions helps quantify traits required for the well-known ten-point-must system. However, continuous tracking of multiple athletes across multiple training sessions remains a challenge, because it is difficult to precisely segment bout boundaries in a recorded video stream. Furthermore, re-identification of the same athlete over different period or even within the same bout remains a challenge. Difficulties are further compounded when a single fixed view video is captured in top-view. This work summarizes our progress in creating a system in an economically single fixed top-view camera. Specifically, we describe improved algorithm for bout transition detection and in-bout continuous player identification without erroneous ID updation or ID switching. From our custom collected data of ~11 hours (athlete count: 45, bouts: 189), our transition detection algorithm achieves 90% accuracy and continuous ID tracking achieves IDU=0, IDS=0

Numerical calculations on the new approach to the cascade theory - I

In the new approach to the cascade theory suggested by Alladi Ramakrishnan and one of us (S. K. S.), we deal with the number of electrons produced between 0 and t in a soft cascade, each of these electrons having an energy greater than E at the point of its production as contrasted with the usual approach where we are interested in the number of electrons with energy greater than E at t. We present here numerical calculations of the mean numbers on the basis of the new approach

Pioneering metallurgy: origins of iron and steel making in the southern Indian subcontinent. Telengana Field Survey

This British Council funded project under the UKIERI scheme (2009 to 2011) brought together a group of researchers who share many years of experience in the study of South Asia’s rich archaeometallurgy and who also share a passionate desire to understand and communicate India’s contribution to the history of science and early pre-eminence in the production of ultra high-carbon steels of the finest quality. This project, entitled ‘Pioneering metallurgy: origins of iron and steel making in the southern Indian subcontinent’, has set itself on the trail of vanishing evidence for pioneering ferrous metallurgy in the Telengana region of Andhra Pradesh, which was once a ‘technological hub’ of the pre-industrial world

Metals and Civilizations: Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on the Beginnings of the use of Metals and Alloys (BUMA VII)(NIAS Special Publication No. SP7-2015)

The proceedings of BUMA VII held in 2009 in Bangalore as part of the renowned international conference series on the 'Beginnings of the Use of Metals and Alloys',are published as an edited volume entitled "Metals and Civilizations'. With twenty eight valuable peer-reviewed papers covering inter-disciplinary research, it widens our knowledge of the use of metals in antiquity and several aspects of the archaeology, archaeometallurgy, historical metallurgy, crafts practices and metallurgical heritage of many Asian and some non-Asian countries

Molecular identification and genetic diversity analysis of sugarcane clones by SSR markers

Sugarcane is one of the important crops with high heterozygosity and phenotypic polymorphism. Varietal identification and characterization is one of the important aspects in any breeding programme. Forty sugarcane clones from Pre -zonal varietal trial (PZVT) conducted at Ugar, North Karnataka were characterized through Simple sequence repeats (SSR) markers using a set of 15 sugarcane specific primer pairs which amplified a total of 164 alleles with an average of 10.93 alleles per pair. Primer NKS 33 was highly polymorphic and produced more than 15 polymorphic alleles and was unique in all the clones studied. Six primers i.e., NKS 2, NKS 6, NKS 7, NKS 40, NKS 42 and NKS 11 were moderately polymorphic by producing 10 to 13 alleles. Percentage of polymorphic bands ranged from 75.0 % (NKS 3) to 100.0 % (NKS 40 and NKS 42). Primers viz., SMC 1039 GC, mSSCIR 54, NKS 2, NKS 7, NKS 9, NKS 33, NKS 40, NKS 42 and NKS 11 were highly informative and generated above 85.0 % of polymorphic bands. Among the primers used, SMC 1039 GC, NKS 33, NKS 42 and NKS 43 produced the maximum number of unique markers in different clones and hence the combined application of these primers will be useful in unambiguous varietal identification. The cluster analysis based on the genetic similarity matrix grouped the 40 clones into two major clusters CI and CII. The largest cluster CII contained the maximum of 38 clones. Cluster C II was further sub-grouped into IIa, IIb, IIc and IId and each sub-cluster comprised 7, 11, 6 and 14 clones respectively. The unique DNA markers and the genetically diverse combinations identified in the present study will enhance the exploitation of genetic diversity present in the clones in breeding programmes and promising twenty eight entries for yield and quality

Locating iron production sites in Telangana, India using satellite imagery

The use of satellite imagery is explored in mapping the distribution of archaeometallurgical sites for iron and steel production and as a tool for potential reconnaissance in northern districts of Telangana. Travellers’ accounts from at least the seventeenth century suggest that this was an area where pre-industrial iron and steel production flourished, which is also testified by the vast amount of archaeometallurgical debris in the region. The geographical distribution of ferrous metal production sites within this landscape has been documented by integrating data from surface surveys on over 100 archaeometallurgical sites with satellite imagery. Despite the constraints that the surface sites could not be dated by archaeological excavation, this pilot study explores how satellite imagery and related experimental procedures may be used to complement surface archaeometallurgical surveys and reconnaissance efforts