Economics of a cooperative milk plant in Trichur (India)

From the very early days of domestication of animals, milk has been a vital food and is still recommended as an essential food containing most of the nutrients required for body growth. Because of the importance of milk in the diet, in most of the advanced nations there has been an increase in its production and use. This increase in milk production has been associated with incentives to producers in the form of increased returns. In the early take off stage of a developing nation, both producers and consumers move to a position where they can obtain knowledge about each others wants and capacities. In the case of milk consumption, consumers, as their standard of living rises, are likely to demand more milk, especially if the per capita consumption is low in the beginning of the take off. As the level of education rises also, consumers become more conscious of the quality of the products they buy. So the availability of pure and wholesome milk at reasonable prices becomes an important matter in a nation with a developing economy. As producers become aware of an increased demand for milk, they can,in anticipation of increased returns, increase their production and thus the supply of milk will also increase. But a mere increase in milk production on farms will not help the producers unless form, place and time utilities are added to basic product. In the case of milk, which should satisfy a high sanitary standard for human consumption in fluid form, processes such as pasteurization or sterilization are necessary, requiring the use of elaborate and specialized equipment. The financial investment required to set up a milk processing plant is so high that under the present economic conditions in Trichur district (India) an individual producer can not process his own milk economically enough to sell it at prevailing prices. Also, in areas where the per capita income as well as the output of milk per producer is very low, processing can be done economically only by pooling resources of producers for the establishment of a processing plant through cooperative effort. This thesis involves an inquiry into the feasibility of organizing such a cooperative enterprise in Trichur (Kerala State, India) through which producers can find an uninterrupted market for their milk and thus a continuous income besides sharing the profits of the organization, ^ the analysis of costs involved in processing and distribution, as well as by the analysis of prospective demand for milk, the study is expected to reveal the following: 1. The changes in cost associated with changing daily volumes of milk receipts in a plant of size appropriate to the local milk supply and demand situations. 2. The costs associated with distribution of milk from this plant to consumers in Trichur. 3. Minimum amounts of milk required to be sold per day to break even on processing and distribution costs from the plant. 4. The anticipated demand for milk as affected by changes in population, per capita income, and social and educational levels in the Trichur area. 5. The supply trends and rate of increase in production of milk necessary to meet the demand. The problem is of importance to the milk producers and consumers of the district. Many producers might commercialize their milk production and so increase their output and gain full-time employment if proper incentives are present. Through cooperative effort many producers can be helped financially and otherwise in producing more high quality milk. The organization not only will act as a marketing institution, but also as a source of information to producers on various technical subjects connected with the production of milk. Consumers, on the other hand,are assured of the availability of pure and wholesome milk. Those consumers in the urban areas of Trichur who at present keep cows (mostly uneconomically) for milk will be encouraged to give up production of milk. This will reduce the number of producers operating uneconomically while producers commercializing production will expand output. Initially the plant might confine its activities to pasteurization and distribution of milk in the Trichur town area only. Later, as demand develops and supply expands, the amount of milk received, at the plant may be increased and activities extended to the production of such products as butter and cheese as well as service to a wider market area

Approaching the quantum critical point in a highly-correlated all-in-all-out antiferromagnet

Continuous quantum phase transition involving all-in–all-out (AIAO) antiferromagnetic order in strongly spin-orbit-coupled 5d compounds could give rise to various exotic electronic phases and strongly-coupled quantum critical phenomena. Here we experimentally trace the AIAO spin order in Sm₂Ir₂O₇ using direct resonant x-ray magnetic diffraction techniques under high pressure. The magnetic order is suppressed at a critical pressure P_c=6.30GPa, while the lattice symmetry remains in the cubic Fd−3m space group across the quantum critical point. Comparing pressure tuning and the chemical series R₂Ir₂O₇ reveals that the approach to the AIAO quantum phase transition is characterized by contrasting evolutions of the pyrochlore lattice constant a and the trigonal distortion surrounding individual Ir moments, which affects the 5d bandwidth and the Ising anisotropy, respectively. We posit that the opposite effects of pressure and chemical tuning lead to spin fluctuations with different Ising and Heisenberg character in the quantum critical region. Finally, the observed low pressure scale of the AIAO quantum phase transition in Sm₂Ir₂O₇ identifies a circumscribed region of P-T space for investigating the putative magnetic Weyl semimetal state

Magnetization of La(2-x)Sr(x)NiO(4+ delta) (0 < x < 0.5) and observation of novel memory effects

We have studied the magnetization of a series of spin-charge ordered La(2-x)Sr(x)NiO(4+delta) single crystals with 0 < x < 0.5. For fields applied parallel to the ab plane there is a large irreversibility below a temperature T(F1) ~ 50 K and a smaller irreversibility that persists up to near the charge ordering temperature. We observed a novel memory effect in the thermo-remnant magnetization across the entire doping range. We found that these materials retain a memory of the temperature at which an external field was removed, and that there is a pronounced increase in the thermo-remnant magnetization when the system is warmed through a spin reorientation transition.Comment: 11 pages, 12 figure

Spin reorientation transition in the incommensurate stripe-ordered phase of La3/2Sr1/2NiO4

The spin ordering of La3/2Sr1/2NiO4 was investigated by magnetization measurements, and by unpolarized- and polarized-neutron diffraction. Spin ordering with an incommensurability epsilon ~ 0.445 is observed below T_so ~ 80 K. On cooling, a spin reorientation is observed at 57 +/- 1 K, with the spin axes rotating from 52 +/- 4 degrees to 78 +/- 3 degrees. This is the first time a spin reorientation has been observed in a La2-xSrxNiO4+delta compound having incommensurate stripe order.Comment: REVTex 4. 4 pages including 4 figures. Minor changes to text. Accepted to be published in Physical Review

Magnetic spectrum of the two-dimensional antiferromagnet La2CoO4 studied by inelastic neutron scattering

We report measurements of the magnetic excitation spectrum of the layered antiferromagnet La2CoO4 by time-of-flight neutron inelastic scattering. In the energy range probed in our experiments (0-250 meV) the magnetic spectrum consists of spin-wave modes with strong in-plane dispersion extending up to 60 meV, and a nearly dispersionless peak at 190 meV. The spin-wave modes exhibit a small (~1 meV) dispersion along the magnetic zone boundary. We show that the magnetic spectrum can be described very well by a model of a Heisenberg antiferromagnet that includes the full spin and orbital degrees of freedom of Co2+ in an axially-distorted crystal field. The collective magnetic dynamics are found to be controlled by dominant nearest-neighbour exchange interactions, strong XY-like single-ion anisotropy and a substantial unquenched orbital angular momentum.Comment: 8 pages, 7 figure

Structural efficiency studies of corrugated compression panels with curved caps and beaded webs

Curved cross-sectional elements are employed in structural concepts for minimum-mass compression panels. Corrugated panel concepts with curved caps and beaded webs are optimized by using a nonlinear mathematical programming procedure and a rigorous buckling analysis. These panel geometries are shown to have superior structural efficiencies compared with known concepts published in the literature. Fabrication of these efficient corrugation concepts became possible by advances made in the art of superplastically forming of metals. Results of the mass optimization studies of the concepts are presented as structural efficiency charts for axial compression

The Temperature Evolution of the Out-of-Plane Correlation Lengths of Charge-Stripe Ordered La(1.725)Sr(0.275)NiO(4)

The temperature dependence of the magnetic order of stripe-ordered La(1.725)Sr(0.275)NiO(4) is investigated by neutron diffraction. Upon cooling, the widths if the magnetic Bragg peaks are observed to broaden. The degree of broadening is found to be very different for l = odd-integer and l = even-integer magnetic peaks. We argue that the observed behaviour is a result of competition between magnetic and charge order.Comment: 3 figure

Quasiparticle Breakdown and Spin Hamiltonian of the Frustrated Quantum Pyrochlore Yb2_2Ti2_2O7_7 in Magnetic Field

The frustrated pyrochlore magnet Yb$_2$Ti$_2$O$_7$ has the remarkable property that it orders magnetically, but has no propagating magnons over wide regions of the Brillouin zone. Here we use inelastic neutron scattering to follow how the spectrum evolves in cubic-axis magnetic fields. At high fields we observe in addition to dispersive magnons also a two-magnon continuum, which grows in intensity upon reducing the field and overlaps with the one-magnon states at intermediate fields leading to strong renormalization of the dispersion relations, and magnon decays. Using heat capacity measurements we find that the low and high field regions are smoothly connected with no sharp phase transition, with the spin gap increasing monotonically in field. Through fits to an extensive data set we re-evaluate the spin Hamiltonian finding dominant quantum exchange terms, which we propose are responsible for the anomalously strong fluctuations and quasiparticle breakdown effects observed at low fields.Comment: 5 pages main text + 19 pages supplemental materia