This paper is a study of the intersection between aviation and diplomacy in the semi-autonomous Indian state of Jodhpur in the final decades of British colonial rule in India. Jodhpur's Maharaja Umaid Singh established a major international aerodrome, patronized one of India's first flying clubs and collaborated with British authorities to make aviation laws for the Indian states. He would also serve in the Royal Air Force during the war and placed Jodhpur state's aviation resources at the disposal of the king-emperor. This paper argues that Jodhpur was able to leverage its aviation resources to wield substantial influence both within and beyond the British Empire through both war and peace. An analysis of Jodhpur's engagement with aviation diplomacy is also revealing of some of the limitations as well as possibilities for the deployment of science diplomacy frameworks, especially in non-Western contexts.

A metasurface reflector-backed wideband planar antenna is designed for millimeter-wave (mmWave) applications. A simple meandering structure is used for radiation element design, while the back side consists of a partial ground plane and parasitic elements. The utilization of meander-shaped element led to small antenna dimensions. The partial ground plane is used to achieve wide bandwidth, while the parasitic elements are used to improve the impedance matching toward higher frequency bands. To achieve high gain and directional radiation characteristics, an array of metasurfaces is placed behind the radiating element. It is observed from the simulated results that the proposed antenna system offers 17.72 GHz of impedance bandwidth in the operating range of 22.28–40 GHz, while the measured impedance bandwidth is noted to be 15.8 GHz, ranging from 23 to 38.8 GHz. Furthermore, it is observed that a metasurface-based planar antenna tends to achieve a peak gain of ≈9 dBi in the band of interest.

This paper investigates how responses of US macroeconomic activities to monetary policy shocks depend on the state of broker–dealer leverage. The analysis makes use of leverage data to create an indicator series that distinguishes above and below-trend leverage states for the economy which is then integrated into switching econometric models. Using state-dependent local projection methods, we find that during the below-trend leverage state, monetary policy affects the economy in a traditional fashion. However, during the above-trend leverage state, expansionary monetary policy is problematic for stimulating the economy. Additionally, during the above-trend leverage state, we find that a policy rate cut raises counterparty risks in financial markets, which in part accounts for the weaker effectiveness of the monetary policy. These findings are robust to several alternative modeling specifications and suggest that monetary policy authorities should monitor the leverage cycle when determining their policy stance on macroeconomic stability.

A spoofing attack on a global navigation satellite system (GNSS) receiver is a threat to a significant community of GNSS users due to the high stakes involved. This paper investigates the use of slope based metrics for the detection of spoofing. The formulation of slope based metrics involves monitoring correlators along with tracking correlators in the receiver's channel, which are slaved to the prompt tracking correlator. In this study, using some candidate metrics, detectors have been formed through the analysis of simulated spoofing attacks. A theoretical variance of each metric has also been calculated as a reference for the threshold. A threshold is estimated using the measured variance from the clean signals, for specific false alarm rate. By using the measured threshold, detectors are formed based on slope metrics. These detectors have been tested using TEXBAT data. The results show that the differential slope metrics have good performance. The results have also been compared with some other techniques of spoofing detection.

Two-photon absorption (TPA) of Au-ion irradiated glasses in the femtosecond regime has been analyzed by an open-aperture Z scan technique. Three types of glasses, namely GIL49, BK7, and Glass B were irradiated by using 1700 keV Au+ ion beams. Samples were post-annealed at 600°C for 5 h. Penetration depth and distribution of Au+ ions having 1700 keV energy within glass substrates were estimated by transport of ions in matter (TRIM) simulations. Detailed calculations with full-damage cascades were performed for each sample, taking into account the chemical composition of glass substrates. TRIM results reveal that there is no significant change in ion range, straggling, and ion distribution with the change in the substrate composition. However, Z scan results showed a difference in TPA coefficients for all three glasses. Extent of crosslinking within each of irradiated sample, owing to its chemical composition, may have affected their TPA coefficients.

The influence of nature and pressure of ambient environment on the surface modification, plasma parameters, hardness, and corrosion resistance of Mg-alloy has been investigated. Nd: YAG laser (1064 nm, 10 ns, 25 mJ) at a fluence of 1.3 J cm−2 has been employed as an irradiation source. Targets of Mg-alloy were exposed in the ambient environments of argon (Ar), neon (Ne), and helium (He) at pressures ranging from 5 to 760 Torr. Scanning electron microscope has been employed to investigate the surface morphology of the irradiated targets. It reveals the formation of cavities, cones, droplets, ripples, and islands on the surface of the irradiated sample. Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy technique was employed to measure electron temperature (Te) and electron number density (Ne) of Mg-alloy. The value of electron temperature ranges from 6628 to 12,855 K, whereas the value of electron number density varies from 5.4 × 1017 to 19.2 × 1017 cm−3. The maximum Te and Ne are observed in Ar and minimum in case of He. It was also revealed that both the surface morphology and plasma parameters are strongly dependent upon nature and pressure of environmental gases. The maxima of Te is achieved at a pressure of 10 Torr for all the three ambient environments that is, Ar, Ne, and He; whereas maxima of Ne is achieved at different pressures, that is, at 760 Torr for Ar, at 200 Torr for Ne, and at 50 Torr for He. The hardness and corrosion resistance of irradiated Mg-alloy have been explored using Vickers Micro-hardness tester and Potentio-dynamic polarization technique, respectively. It was investigated that as compared with un-irradiated target, the hardness as well as corrosion resistance of the laser-irradiated target has been increased significantly in all environments. Plasma parameters, mechanical, and electrical properties of laser-irradiated Mg-alloy have been correlated with induced surface modifications and are strongly influenced by environmental conditions.

During epidemics of cholera in two rural sites (Bakerganj and Mathbaria), a much higher proportion of patients came for treatment with severe dehydration than was seen in previous years. V. cholerae O1 isolated from these patients was found to be El Tor in its phenotype, but its cholera toxin (CT) was determined to be that of classical biotype. Whether the observed higher proportion of severe dehydration produced by the El Tor biotype was due to a shift from El Tor to classical CT or due to other factors is not clear. However, if cholera due to strains with increased severity spread to other areas where treatment facilities are limited, there are likely to be many more cholera deaths.