A wavelet cross-spectral analysis of solar–ENSO–rainfall connections in the Indian monsoons

The possible connections between the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon and Indian monsoon rainfall have been widely discussed in the meteorological literature. We show strong statistical evidence here for connections of ENSO with solar activity. This is particularly evident in a comparison between the two contrasting test periods of 1878–1913 and 1933–1964, representing three complete cycles of lowest and highest solar activity respectively since 1850. Wavelet statistical analysis reveals that the link between solar activity and ENSO is generally stronger than that between ENSO and rainfall but only slightly weaker than that between solar activity and rainfall. Over the two test periods an increase in solar activity is associated with a decrease in ENSO indices and an increase in the monsoon rainfall in the 8–16 y period band. In the 2–7 y period band the effects vary with region. The net effect of solar processes on rainfall thus appears to be the result of counteracting or cooperating influences on shorter (about 5–6 y) and longer (about 11–12 y) time scales, the latter on the whole dominating over the former. The present analysis thus suggests that the influence of solar processes on Indian rainfall operates in part indirectly through ENSO, but on more than one time scale.     

Stress in polycrystalline GaN films prepared by r.f sputtering

Undoped, Be-doped and Si-doped polycrystalline GaN films were deposited by R.F. sputtering onto fused silica substrates. The films were deposited at various deposition temperatures ranging from 300 K to 623 K and characterized by optical measurements while the microstructural information was obtained from SEM and XRD studies. The compositional study for the GaN film was carried out using SIMS. Residual stresses in these films were evaluated from the band tail of the absorption spectra as well as from direct measurements of hardness by commercially available depth sensing indentometer. It was observed that undoped GaN films had the highest hardness followed by that for Be-doped and Si-doped films. The values of hardness obtained form the above optical measurement tallied quite well with those obtained from direct indentation measurement.     

Mössbauer studies of ɛ-Fe3−x Ni x N and γ′-Fe4−y Ni y N nanoparticles

Nanocrystalline ?-Fe_3?x Ni _x N (0.0?≤?×?≤?0.8) particles are synthesized by precursor technique and nitridation of decomposed products in NH₃ (g) in the temperature range 673 K-823 K. For x?=?0.1–0.4 compositions, single phase ?-Fe_3?x Ni _x N hexagonal structure with space group P6₃/mmc is formed, while for x?=?0.5–0.8, fcc γ′-Fe_4?y Ni _y N phase is also precipitated. The room temperature Mössbauer spectrum for all the compositions shows the presence of superparamagnetic doublet, which is attributed to ?-Fe_3?x Ni _x N phase. For x?=?0.5–0.8 compositions, two additional sextets are observed corresponding to two different iron sites, the corner position (Fe^c) and the fcc position (Fe^f), in γ′-Fe_4?y Ni _y N. The added Ni atoms preferentially substitute the corner Fe^c positions. The isomer shift, quadrupole splitting and hyperfine field values are found to change with the Ni content.     

A soft-segmentation visualization scheme for magnetic resonance images

Prevalent visualization tools exploit gray value distribution in images through modified histogram equalization and matching technique, referred to as the window width/window level-based method, to improve visibility and enhance diagnostic value. The window width/window level tool is extensively used in magnetic resonance (MR) images to highlight tissue boundaries during image interpretation. However, the identification of different regions and distinct boundaries between them based on gray-level distribution and displayed intensity levels is extremely difficult because of the large dynamic range of tissue intensities inherent in MR images. We propose a soft-segmentation visualization scheme to generate pixel partitions from the histogram of MR image data using a connectionist approach and then generate selective visual depictions of pixel partitions using pseudo color based on an appropriate fuzzy membership function. By applying the display scheme in clinical examples in this study, we could demonstrate additional overlapping regions between distinct tissue types in healthy and diseased areas (in the brain) that could help improve the tissue characterization ability of MR images.     

Quasi-one dimensional graphite ribbon structures in the presence of a magnetic field and the on-site Coulomb correlation at half-filling

We have presented the role of the Coulomb interaction (U) and the magnetic field [(B)\vec]\vec{B} on the ground state properties of the quasi-one dimensional graphite ribbon structures at half-filling. Mean field Hartree-Fock Approximation is used to study the systems. To understand the boundary effects in graphite structures, we have compared the results of these systems with those of the square lattice ribbon structures. Studying the density of states, the Drude weight and the charge gap, we have drawn the U – B phase diagrams for the zigzag and the armchair graphite ribbons.     

Receiving sensitivity and transmitting voltage response of a fluid loaded spherical piezoelectric transducer with an elastic coating

A method is presented to determine the response of a spherical acoustic transducer that consists of a fluid-filled piezoelectric sphere with an elastic coating embedded in infinite fluid to electrical and plane-wave acoustic excitations. The exact spherically symmetric, linear, differential, governing equations are used for the interior and exterior fluids, and elastic and piezoelectric materials. Under acoustic excitation and open circuit boundary condition, the equation governing the piezoelectric sphere is homogeneous and the solution is expressed in terms of Bessel functions. Under electrical excitation, the equation governing the piezoelectric sphere is inhomogeneous and the complementary solution is expressed in terms of Bessel functions and the particular integral is expressed in terms of a power series. Numerical results are presented to illustrate the effect of dimensions of the piezoelectric sphere, fluid loading, elastic coating and internal material losses on the open-circuit receiving sensitivity and transmitting voltage response of the transducer.     

Twist‐dependent stacking energy of base‐pair steps in B‐DNA geometry: A density functional theory approach

Stacking energy of all the 10 unique DNA base‐pair steps (bp step) are calculated using density functional theory within the ultrasoft pseudopotential plane wave method and local density approximation for the exchange‐correlation functional. We have studied the dependence of stacking energy on twist angle, an aspect found difficult to explain using classical theory. We have found that the twist angle for different bp steps at stacking energy minimum matches extremely well with the values of average twist obtained from B‐DNA crystal structure data. This indicates that the use of a proper quantum chemical method to calculate the π‐π electronic interactions may explain stacking energy without incorporating hydrophobic interaction through solvent or effect of backbone through pseudobond. From the twist angle‐dependent stacking energy profile, we have also generated the probability distributions of twist for all the bp steps and calculated the variance of the distribution. Our calculated variances show similar trend to that of the experimental data for which sufficient numbers of data are available. The TA, AT, and CG doublets show large variances among the 10 possible bp steps, indicating their maximum flexibility. This might be the case of unusual deformation observed at the TATA‐box while binding to TBP protein. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Quantum Chem, 2008     

Perturbing π-clouds with Substituents to Study the Effects on Reaction Dynamics of gauche-1,3-Butadiene to Bicyclobutane Electrocyclization

The conical intersection (CI) governs the ultra-fast relaxation of excited states in a radiationless manner and are observed mainly in photochemical processes. In the current work, we investigated the effects of substituents on the reaction dynamics for the conversion of gauche-1,3-butadiene to bicyclobutane via photochemical electrocyclization. We incorporated both electron withdrawing (−F) and donating (−CH₃) groups in the conjugated system. In our study, we optimized the minimum energy conical intersection (MECI) geometries using the multi-configurational state-averaged CASSCF approach, whereas, to study the ground state reaction pathways for the substituted derivatives, dispersion corrected, B3LYP-D3 functional was used. The non-adiabatic surface hopping molecular dynamics simulations were performed to observe the behaviour of electronic states involved throughout the photoconversion process. The results obtained from the multi-reference second-order perturbation correction of energy at the XMS-CASPT2 level of theory, topography analysis, and non-adiabatic dynamics suggest that the −CH₃ substituted derivatives can undergo faster thermal conversion to the product in the ground state with a smaller activation energy barrier compared to −F substituted derivative. Our study also reveals that the GBUT to BIBUT conversion follows both conrotatory and disrotatory pathways, whereas, on substitution with −F or −CH₃, the conversion proceeds via the conrotatory pathway.     

On the decay of the ozonide radical in aqueous alkaline solutions

In flash photolysis of an oxygenated aqueous potassium persulphate solution at pH 12.5 the decay of the ozonide radical has been found to follow $\text{3}\text{2}$ order kinetics which has been explained by reactions O^?₃ + O^? ? 2 O^?₂ and O^?₃ + HO₂ → 2 O₂ + OH^?     

Confined systems and the modified virial theorem from semiclassical considerations

We show that two simple semiclassical strategies, one based on the Wilson–Sommerfeld rule and the other on the uncertainty principle, yield the exact modified form of the virial theorem for confined systems. An alternative, easier quantum mechanical route to arrive at this result is also sketched. Pilot calculations on confined oscillators reveal decisive trends. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Int J Quantum Chem, 2005