Arsenic induced hematological and biochemical responses in nutritionally important catfish Clarias batrachus (L.)

AbstractThe impact of sublethal toxicity of sodium arsenite on hematological and certain biochemical parameters of the fresh water catfish Clarias batrachus has been analyzed following exposure of sublethal concentration (1mg/L; 5% of LC50 value) of sodium arsenite for 10, 30, 45, and 60 days. Arsenic bioaccumulation in the blood tissue of the fish increased progressively with increased period of exposure. The values of total erythrocyte count (TECs), total leucocytes count (TLCs), hemoglobin concentration, and packed cell volume (PCV) 1.40±0.03×106/mm3, 174.83±2.74×103/mm3, 5.01±0.26g/100ml, 25.00±1.06 were observed respectively at the end of 60 days of exposure. The results of hematological indices were found to be 179.23±8.81fl/cell for mean corpuscular volume (MCV), 35.92±1.89pg/cell for mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH) and 20.17±1.12g/dl for mean corpuscular hemoglobin concentration (MCHC). The present findings are clearly indicating severe fish anemia due to the arsenic salt exposure. The continued arsenic toxicity results in decreased serum protein concentration that might be a cause for the loss of weight as well as weakness in the fish

Advantage of BIOX tank technology over aeration tank in secondary biological treatment

Advantage of BIOX tank technology over aeration tank in secondary biological treatmen

LAMBDA: Large Area Modular BaF2 Detector Array for the measurement of high energy gamma rays

A large BaF2 detector array along with its dedicated CAMAC electronics and VME based data acquisition system has been designed, constructed and installed successfully at VECC, Kolkata for studying high energy gamma rays (E>8 MeV). The array consists of 162 detector elements. The detectors were fabricated from bare barium fluoride crystals (each measuring 35 cm in length and having cross-sectional area of 3.5 cm X 3.5 cm X 35.0 cm). The basic properties of the detectors (energy resolution, time resolution, efficiency, uniformity, fast to slow ratio etc.) were studied exhaustively. Complete GEANT3 monte carlo simulations were performed to optimize the detector design and also to generate the response function. The detector system has been used successfully to measure high energy photons from 113Sb, formed by bombarding 145 and 160 MeV 20Ne beams on a 93Nb target. The measured experimental spectra are in good agreement with those from a modified version of the statistical model code CASCADE. In this paper, we present the complete description of this detector array along with its in-beam performance.Comment: 18 pages, 14 figures, accepted in NIM

Observation of multiple doubly degenerate bands in ¹⁹⁵Tl

The High-spin states in 195 Tl, populated through the 185,187 Re( 13 C, xn) fusion evaporation reaction at the beam energy of 75 MeV, were studied using the Indian National Gamma Array (INGA). More than 50 new γ transitions have been placed in the proposed level scheme which is extended up to the excitation energy of ≈ 5.6 MeV and spin =22.5ħ . Two pairs of degenerate bands based on two different quasi-particle configurations have been identified in this nucleus indicating the first observation of such bands in an odd- A nucleus in A∼190 region and signify the first evidence of multiple chiral bands in a nucleus in this region. The total Routhian surface calculations predict triaxial shapes for both the configurations and thereby, support the experimental observation. The importance of multiple neutron holes in the i13/2 orbital and the stability of shapes for these two configurations have been discussed.Financial support of Department of Science & Technology, Govt. of India for clover detectors of INGA (Grant No. IR/S2/PF-03/2003-II) is greatfully acknowledged. One of the authors (S. Bhattacharya) acknowledges with thanks the financial support received as Raja Ramanna Fellowship from the Department of Atomic Energy, Govt. of India. T.R and Md. A.A acknowledge with thanks the financial support received as research fellows from the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE), Govt. of India

Thermodynamics of Gauss-Bonnet black holes revisited

We investigate the Gauss-Bonnet black hole in five dimensional anti-de Sitter spacetimes (GBAdS). We analyze all thermodynamic quantities of the GBAdS, which is characterized by the Gauss-Bonnet coupling $c$ and mass $M$, comparing with those of the Born-Infeld-AdS (BIAdS), Reissner-Norstr\"om-AdS black holes (RNAdS), Schwarzschild-AdS (SAdS), and BTZ black holes. For $c<0$ we cannot obtain the black hole with positively definite thermodynamic quantities of mass, temperature, and entropy because the entropy does not satisfy the area-law. On the other hand, for $c>0$, we find the BIAdS-like black hole, showing that the coupling $c$ plays the role of pseudo-charge. Importantly, we could not obtain the SAdS in the limits of $c\to 0$, which means that the GBAdS is basically different from the SAdS. In addition, we clarify the connections between thermodynamic and dynamical stability. Finally, we also conjecture that if a black hole is big and thus globally stable, its quasinormal modes may take analytic expressions.Comment: 22 pages, 8 figures, version to appear in EPJ

Origins of the Ambient Solar Wind: Implications for Space Weather

The Sun's outer atmosphere is heated to temperatures of millions of degrees, and solar plasma flows out into interplanetary space at supersonic speeds. This paper reviews our current understanding of these interrelated problems: coronal heating and the acceleration of the ambient solar wind. We also discuss where the community stands in its ability to forecast how variations in the solar wind (i.e., fast and slow wind streams) impact the Earth. Although the last few decades have seen significant progress in observations and modeling, we still do not have a complete understanding of the relevant physical processes, nor do we have a quantitatively precise census of which coronal structures contribute to specific types of solar wind. Fast streams are known to be connected to the central regions of large coronal holes. Slow streams, however, appear to come from a wide range of sources, including streamers, pseudostreamers, coronal loops, active regions, and coronal hole boundaries. Complicating our understanding even more is the fact that processes such as turbulence, stream-stream interactions, and Coulomb collisions can make it difficult to unambiguously map a parcel measured at 1 AU back down to its coronal source. We also review recent progress -- in theoretical modeling, observational data analysis, and forecasting techniques that sit at the interface between data and theory -- that gives us hope that the above problems are indeed solvable.Comment: Accepted for publication in Space Science Reviews. Special issue connected with a 2016 ISSI workshop on "The Scientific Foundations of Space Weather." 44 pages, 9 figure

Single Spin Asymmetry ANA_N in Polarized Proton-Proton Elastic Scattering at s=200\sqrt{s}=200 GeV

We report a high precision measurement of the transverse single spin asymmetry $A_N$ at the center of mass energy $\sqrt{s}=200$ GeV in elastic proton-proton scattering by the STAR experiment at RHIC. The $A_N$ was measured in the four-momentum transfer squared $t$ range $0.003 \leqslant |t| \leqslant 0.035$ \GeVcSq, the region of a significant interference between the electromagnetic and hadronic scattering amplitudes. The measured values of $A_N$ and its $t$-dependence are consistent with a vanishing hadronic spin-flip amplitude, thus providing strong constraints on the ratio of the single spin-flip to the non-flip amplitudes. Since the hadronic amplitude is dominated by the Pomeron amplitude at this $\sqrt{s}$, we conclude that this measurement addresses the question about the presence of a hadronic spin flip due to the Pomeron exchange in polarized proton-proton elastic scattering.Comment: 12 pages, 6 figure

Search for displaced vertices arising from decays of new heavy particles in 7 TeV pp collisions at ATLAS

We present the results of a search for new, heavy particles that decay at a significant distance from their production point into a final state containing charged hadrons in association with a high-momentum muon. The search is conducted in a pp-collision data sample with a center-of-mass energy of 7 TeV and an integrated luminosity of 33 pb^-1 collected in 2010 by the ATLAS detector operating at the Large Hadron Collider. Production of such particles is expected in various scenarios of physics beyond the standard model. We observe no signal and place limits on the production cross-section of supersymmetric particles in an R-parity-violating scenario as a function of the neutralino lifetime. Limits are presented for different squark and neutralino masses, enabling extension of the limits to a variety of other models.Comment: 8 pages plus author list (20 pages total), 8 figures, 1 table, final version to appear in Physics Letters