Anticorrosive properties of the epoxy–cardanol resin based paints

An epoxy–cardanol resin was developed using epichlorohydrin, bisphenol-A and cardanol. On evaluation it was found that epoxy–cardanol resin exhibits better properties as compared to epoxy resin in terms of increase in tensile strength, elongation, bond with steel and lowering of water vapour transmission of the film. The improvement in these properties indicated that the paints based on modified resin would be more durable than the epoxy based paints. Accordingly, paints were formulated using the developed resin and their performance were compared with their counterparts made with unmodified epoxy resin. Zinc powder, zinc phosphate, micaceous iron oxide and synthetic iron oxide were used as pigments along with fillers, additives and an aromatic polyamine adduct hardener. For both types of paints similar doses of pigments and additives were used. Physico-mechanical properties, chemical resistance and corrosion protection efficiency of the formulated paints were determined. It was found that the anticorrosive properties of epoxy–cardanol resin based paints are superior to that of the paints formulated with the unmodified epoxy resin. Micaceous iron oxide based paints in epoxy–cardanol resin showed the best performance followed by zinc phosphate based paints. It is concluded that the developed resin is a better binder media for the formulation of paints.     

Suppression of fuel and air stream diluted methane–air partially premixed flames in normal and microgravity

The effects of fuel and air stream dilution (ASD) with carbon dioxide on the suppression of normal and microgravity laminar methane–air partially premixed coflow jet flames were experimentally and numerically investigated. Experiments were conducted both in our normal-gravity laboratory and at the NASA Glenn Research Center 2.2 s drop tower. Measurements included flame topology and liftoff heights of diluted flames, critical diluent mole fractions for flame blowout, and the radiant heat loss from flames. The flames were also simulated using an axisymmetric unsteady numerical code that utilizes detailed chemistry and transport models. In addition, counterflow flame simulation results were used to examine similitude between the counterflow and coflow flame suppression, and further characterize the effectiveness of fuel stream versus ASD on flame extinction. A smaller relative fuel stream dilution (FSD) extinguishes partially premixed flames (PPFs) with increasing premixing as compared to dilution of the air stream. Conversely, smaller ASD is required to extinguish PPFs as they become less premixed and approach nonpremixed (NP) behavior. Fuel stream diluted PPFs and air stream diluted NP flames extinguish primarily through a reactant dilution effect while fuel stream diluted NP flames and air stream diluted PPF are extinguished primarily by a thermal cooling effect. Normal gravity flames lift off and blow out with a smaller diluent mole fraction than microgravity flames. The difference between the fuel and ASD effectiveness increases as the gravitational acceleration is reduced. Radiation heat losses are observed to increase with increasing diluent mole fraction and decreasing gravity.     

Chemopreventive Effect of Different Ratios of Fish Oil and Corn Oil in Experimental Colon Carcinogenesis

n-3 Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA) have a chemopreventive effect while n-6 PUFA promote carcinogenesis. The effect of these essential fatty acids may be related to oxidative stress. Therefore, the study was designed to evaluate the effect of different ratios of fish oil (FO) and corn oil (CO) in the prevention of colon cancer. Male Wistar rats were divided into control, dimethylhydrazine dihydrochloride (DMH) treated, FO + CO (1:1) and FO + CO (2.5:1). All the groups, except the control received a weekly injection of DMH for 4 weeks. The animals were sacrificed either 48 h later (initiation phase) or kept for 16 weeks (post initiation phase). DMH treatment in the initiation phase animals showed mild to moderate inflammation, decreased ROS and TrxR activity, increased antioxidants, apoptosis and ACF multiplicity. The post initiation study showed severe inflammation with hyperplasia, increased ACF multiplicity and ROS levels, a decrease in antioxidants and apoptosis. The FO + CO (1:1) treated animals showed severe inflammation, a decrease in ROS, an increase in antioxidants and apoptosis in the initiation phase. FO + CO (1:1) in the post initiation phase and FO + CO (2.5:1) in the initiation showed mild inflammation, increased ROS, apoptosis and decreased antioxidants. There was a decrease in ACF multiplicity and ROS levels, increased antioxidants and apoptosis in the post initiation phase study. The present study suggests that FO has a dose- and time-dependent chemopreventive effect in colon cancer mediated through oxidative stress and apoptosis.     

Grain growth of high Tc YBa2Cu3O7−x

Grain growth during sintering of the polycrystalline high onset temperature superconductor YBa₂Cu₃O_7−x has been examined by measuring grain sizes at various temperatures for different times above 900°C. The grain size distribution is found to be predominately lognormal after some sintering time. The mean grain size increases with both temperature and time. The standard deviation of the grain size distribution increases with temperature, but appears to be independent of time. The grain growth law may have an exponent of five. The grain growth rate may be affected by the grain size of the calcined powder.     

Performance analysis of a variable‐gain amplify‐and‐forward relayed mixed RF‐FSO system

In this work, an amplify‐and‐forward variable‐gain relayed mixed RF‐FSO system is studied. The considered dual‐hop system consists of a radio frequency (RF) link followed by a free space optical (FSO) channel. The RF link is affected by short‐term multipath fading and long‐term shadowing effects and is assumed to follow the generalized‐K fading distribution that approximates accurately several important distributions often used to model communication channels. The FSO channel experiences fading caused by atmospheric turbulence that is modeled by the gamma‐gamma distribution characterizing moderate and strong turbulence conditions. The FSO channel also suffers path loss and pointing error induced misalignment fading. The performance of the considered system is analyzed under the collective influence of distribution shaping parameters, pointing errors that result in misalignment fading, atmospheric turbulence, and path loss. The moment‐generating function of the Signal power to noise power ratio measured end‐to‐end for this system is derived. The cumulative distribution function for the Signal power to noise power ratio present between the source and destination receiver is also evaluated. Further, we investigate the error and outage performance and the average channel capacity for this system. The analytical expressions in closed form for the outage probability, symbol and bit error rate considering different modulation schemes and channel capacity are also derived. The mathematical expressions obtained are also demonstrated by numerical plots.     

Maintaining frame rate perception in interactive environments by?exploiting audio-visual cross-modal interaction

The entertainment industry, primarily the video games industry, continues to dictate the development and performance requirements of graphics hardware and computer graphics algorithms. However, despite the enormous progress in the last few years, it is still not possible to achieve some of industry’s demands, in particular high-fidelity rendering of complex scenes in real-time, on a single desktop machine. A realisation that sound/music and other senses are important to entertainment led to an investigation of alternative methods, such as cross-modal interaction in order to try and achieve the goal of “realism in real-time”. In this paper we investigate the cross-modal interaction between vision and audition for reducing the amount of computation required to compute visuals by introducing movement related sound effects. Additionally, we look at the effect of camera movement speed on temporal visual perception. Our results indicate that slow animations are perceived as smoother than fast animations. Furthermore, introducing the sound effect of footsteps to walking animations further increased the animation smoothness perception. This has the consequence that for certain conditions, the number of frames that need to be rendered each second can be reduced, saving valuable computation time, without the viewer being aware of this reduction. The results presented are another step towards the full understanding of the auditory-visual cross-modal interaction and its importance for helping achieve “realism int real-time”.     

Double emulsion‐encapsulated guggul exhibits improved in vivo hypocholesterolaemic action in rats

Guggul tree or Commiphora mukul is a small thorny herb having remarkable hypocholesterolaemic properties. Its therapeutic effects are because of its biocomponent guggulsterones, especially guggulsterone E and Z. In this research, double emulsion‐based spread was tried to improve the bioavailability of the herb guggul in in vivo rat model. The effect of the different diets with encapsulated and nonencapsulated guggul was evaluated and compared after 6 weeks, based on the final body weight and analysis of organs, serum and faeces of normal and hypercholesterolaemic (H) rats. It was evident from the results that double emulsion‐encapsulated guggul showed better control on weight of H rats (25.98% lower), inhibition of HMG CoA reductase (3.95 times less) activity and reduction in atherosclerotic index (47.2%), as compared to diet with unencapsulated guggul. Encapsulation of guggul also improved faecal excretion of bile acids, lipids and total cholesterol in H and normal rats.     

Zincated Nanoclay Polymer Composites (ZNCPCs): Synthesis,Characterization, Biodegradation and Controlled Release Behaviour in Soil

Novel zincated nanoclay polymer composites (ZNCPCs) with variable percentage of commercial bentonite and nanobentonite (8%, 10% and 12% of monomer for each case) were synthesized. Polyacrylic acid-Polyacrylamide copolymer was synthesized using N, N-Methylene bisacrylamide as crosslinker and ammonium persulfate as initiator. Clays as well as ZNCPCs were characterized by XRD, SEM, TEM and FTIR. 12% nanoclay containing formulation showed slowest release rate. ZNCPCs containing 8% clay recorded highest Zn content as well as highest equilibrium water absorbency. Biodegradation study revealed that Aspergillus spp was more effective as compared with Trichoderma spp in degradation of ZNCPCs.     

Whole grains and resistant starch rich,reduced‐calorie biscuit diet as a hypoglycaemic,hypolipidaemic and insulin stimulator in streptozotocin‐induced diabetic rats

A fibre‐enriched, reduced‐calorie biscuit [formulated biscuit (FB)] was evaluated for its antidiabetic and antilipidaemic potential in streptozotocin‐induced diabetes in Wistar rats against control biscuit (CB) having high calorie and low fibre content. Animals were allocated into five groups: a control group fed with synthetic diet, two diabetes‐induced groups (CBD and FBD) and two nondiabetic groups (CBND and FBND). CBD and CBND were fed with synthetic diet + CB while FBD and FBND were fed with synthetic diet + FB. After 6 weeks of feeding, the change in weight of nondiabetic group fed with FB (+16.20%) was nonsignificantly lower compared to control (+33.01%) and CB‐fed (+34.55%) group. Nonsignificant loss in body weight was observed among diabetic group fed with FB (?11.76%) or CB (?36.88%). Feeding of FB led to a significant decrease in fasting and postprandial blood glucose levels, total cholesterol, triglycerides, LDL‐C, VLDL‐C and atherosclerotic index and increase the HDL‐C. Histological examination showed that feeding of FB was able to partially recover the destroyed β‐cell in STZ‐induced diabetic rats.