A technique for digital steganography using chaotic maps

Chaos has been applied extensively in secure communication over the last decade, but most of the chaotic security protocols defined, are cryptographically weak or slow to compute. Also, study of chaotic phenomena as application in security area is not discussed in detail. In this paper, we have intensely studied chaos, their influence in secure communications and proposed a steganography technique in spatial domain for digital images based upon chaotic maps. By applying chaos effectively in secure communication, the strength of the overall anticipated algorithm has been increased to a significant level. In addition, few security statistical analyses such as correlation, entropy, energy, contrast, homogeneity, peak signal to noise ratio, and mean square error have also been carried out and shown that it can survive against various differential attacks such as the known message attack, known cover attack, known stego attack, and stego only attack.     

Genotypic Variability Among Soybean Genotypes Under NaCl Stress and Proteome Analysis of Salt-Tolerant Genotype

The present investigation was conducted to evaluate salt tolerance in ten genotypes of soybean (Glycine max L.). Twelve-day-old seedlings, grown hydroponically, were treated with 0, 25, 50, 75, 100, 125 and 150?mM NaCl for 10?days. Growth, lipid peroxidation and antioxidant enzyme activities were evaluated. Growth, measured in terms of length, fresh weight and dry weight of plants, was drastically reduced in Pusa-24 while there was little effect of NaCl treatment on Pusa-37 genotype of soybean. High level of lipid peroxidation was observed in Pusa-24 as indicated by increased level of malondialdehyde. Activities of superoxide dismutase, catalase, ascorbate peroxidase and glutathione reductase were maximum in Pusa-37 where 9-, 1-, 5- and 6-fold increase over control were observed, respectively. The results suggested that Pusa-24 and Pusa-37 are salt-sensitive and salt-tolerant genotype of soybean, respectively, and antioxidant defence system is involved in conferring the sensitiveness and tolerance in these genotypes. Salt-tolerant genotype Pusa-37, was further analysed by 2-dimensional gel electrophoresis to analyse the differential expression of proteins at high salt stress. In the present study, 173 protein spots were identified. Of these, 40 proteins were responsive to salinity in that they were either up- or downregulated. This study could help us in identifying the possible regulatory switches (gene/s) controlling novel proteins of the salt-tolerant genotype of the crop plants and their possible role in defence mechanism.     

Capacity switching options under rivalry and uncertainty

Deregulated infrastructure industries exhibit stiff competition for market share. Firms may be able to limit the effects of competition by launching new projects in stages. Using a two-stage real options model, we explore the value of such flexibility. We first demonstrate that the value of investing in a sequential manner for a monopolist is positive but decreases with uncertainty. Next, we find that a typical duopoly firm’s value relative to a monopolist’s decreases with uncertainty as long as the loss in market share is high. Intriguingly, this result is reversed for a low loss in market share. We finally show that this loss in value is reduced if a firm invests in a sequential manner and specify the conditions under which sequential capacity expansion is more valuable for a duopolist firm than for a monopolist.     

Analysis of regular and irregular acoustic streaming patterns in a rectangular enclosure

This study reports an experimental investigation of the non-linear phenomena of regular (classical) and irregular streaming patterns generated in an air-filled rigid-walled square channel subjected to the acoustic standing waves of different frequencies and intensities. The interaction of acoustic waves and thermoviscous fluids is responsible for these phenomena. The resonator’s walls are maintained at isothermal condition. Synchronized particle image velocimetry (PIV) technique has been used to measure the streaming velocity fields. The experimental results show that at a given excitation frequency, regular streaming flow patterns are observed up to a certain value of the excitation amplitude. As the amplitude increases beyond this limit, the regular streaming is distorted to an irregular flow structure. The regular and irregular streaming are classified in terms of streaming Reynolds number . It is found that for Re_s2<50, classical streaming flow patterns are established and then deform to irregular and complex shapes as Re_s2 exceeds 50.     

Biomedical and Antioxidant Potentialities in Chilli: Perspectives and Way Forward

Worldwide, since ages and nowadays, traditional medicine is well known, owing to its biodiversity, which immensely contributed to the advancement and development of complementary and alternative medicines. There is a wide range of spices, herbs, and trees known for their medicinal uses. Chilli peppers, a vegetable cum spice crop, are bestowed with natural bioactive compounds, flavonoids, capsaicinoids, phytochemicals, phytonutrients, and pharmacologically active compounds with potential health benefits. Such compounds manifest their functionality over solo-treatment by operating in synergy and consortium. Co-action of these compounds and nutrients make them potentially effective against coagulation, obesity, diabetes, inflammation, dreadful diseases, such as cancer, and microbial diseases, alongside having good anti-oxidants with scavenging ability to free radicals and oxygen. In recent times, capsaicinoids especially capsaicin can ameliorate important viral diseases, such as SARS-CoV-2. In addition, capsaicin provides an ability to chilli peppers to ramify as topical agents in pain-relief and also benefitting man as a potential effective anesthetic agent. Such phytochemicals involved not only make them useful and a much economical substitute to wonder/artificial drugs but can be exploited as obscene drugs for the production of novel stuffs. The responsibility of the TRPV1 receptor in association with capsaicin in mitigating chronic diseases has also been justified in this study. Nonetheless, medicinal studies pertaining to consumption of chilli peppers are limited and demand confirmation of the findings from animal studies. In this artifact, an effort has been made to address in an accessible format the nutritional and biomedical perspectives of chilli pepper, which could precisely upgrade and enrich our pharmaceutical industries towards human well-being.     

Efficient aerial oxidation of different types of alcohols using ZnO nanoparticle–MnCO3-graphene oxide composites

Graphene–metal nanocomposites have been found to remarkably enhance the catalytic performance of metal nanoparticle-based catalysts. In continuation of our previous report, in which highly reduced graphene oxide (HRG)-based nanocomposites were synthesized and evaluated, we present nanocomposites of graphene oxide (GRO) and ZnO nanoparticle-doped MnCO₃ ([ZnO–MnCO₃/(1%)GRO]) synthesized via a facile, straightforward co-precipitation technique. Interestingly, it was noticed that the incorporation of GRO in the catalytic system could noticeably improve the catalytic efficiency compared to a catalyst (ZnO–MnCO₃) without GRO, for aerial oxidation of benzyl alcohol (BzOH) employing O₂ as a nature-friendly oxidant under base-free conditions. The impacts of various reaction factors were thoroughly explored to optimize reaction conditions using oxidation of BzOH to benzaldehyde (BzH) as a model substrate. The catalysts were characterized using X-ray diffraction, thermogravimetric analysis, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, field-emission scanning electron microscopy, Energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX), Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET), and Raman spectroscopy. The (1%)ZnO–MnCO₃/(1%)GRO exhibited significant specific activity (67 mmol.g⁻¹.hr⁻¹) with full convversion of BzOH and >99% BzH selectivity within just 6 min. The catalytic efficiency of the (1%)ZnO–MnCO₃/(1%)GRO nanocomposite was significantly better than the (1%)ZnO–MnCO₃/(1%)HRG and (1%)ZnO–MnCO₃ catalysts, presumably due to the existence of oxygen-possessing groups on the GRO surface and as well as a very high surface area that could have been instrumental in uniformly dispersing the active sites of the catalyst, i.e., ZnO–MnCO₃. Under optimum circumstances, various kinds of alcohols were selectively transformed to respective carbonyls with full convertibility over the (1%)ZnO–MnCO₃/(1%)GRO catalyst. Furthermore, the highly effective (1%)ZnO–MnCO₃/(1%)GRO catalyst could be successfully reused and recycled over five consecutive runs with a marginal reduction in its performance and selectivity.     

Strangeness production in quark-gluon plasma

In this paper it is shown that the strangeness production in quark-gluon plasma might not serve as an experimental signature for the formation of quark-gluon plasma. Our results are completely based on the computer simulation of the plasma. We have taken into account the full three-dimensional hydrodynamic expansion of the plasma.     

A mathematical model for the study of gliding motion of bacteria on a layer of non‐Newtonian slime

This paper is concerned with a mathematical hydrodynamical model of motility involving an undulating cell surface. The cell surface transmits stresses through a layer of exuded slime to the substratum. The slime is considered as a Johnson–Segalman fluid. A perturbation approach is used to find the analytic solution. Analytical expressions for the stream function, velocity, pressure gradient and pressure rise over a wavelength as well as the corresponding computational results are presented. The propulsive and lift forces and the power required for gliding propulsion have also been determined. The presented mechanism is found to generate a force for the propulsion of glider at a realistic speed and requires an output of power that is much less than the organism's metabolic rate of energy production. It is observed that unlike the Newtonian case of slime, the lift force is generated due to the Weissenberg number for non‐Newtonian slime, represented by the model of Johnson–Segalman fluid. It is also found that power required for translation in Johnson–Segalman fluid is reduced. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.