The Nilgiri tahr Nilgiritragus hylocrius is an Endangered species of mountain ungulate endemic to the Western Ghats of India, a biodiversity hotspot. Habitat fragmentation, hunting and a restricted range are the major threats to this species. Although several surveys have assessed the species’ status, a population estimate based on a scientifically robust method is needed. We used the double-observer method to estimate the population of the Nilgiri tahr in the Anamalai Tiger Reserve, a protected area in the Western Ghats. We walked 257 km of transects across the Reserve, covering 36 grassland blocks (i.e. clusters of montane grasslands that were relatively separate from each other). We counted a minimum of 422 individuals in 28 groups, and estimated the tahr population in the study area to be 510 individuals (95% CI 300–858) in 35 groups. The male:female ratio was 0.71 and the young:female ratio was 0.56. Comparing our estimate with previous surveys suggests that the Nilgiri tahr population in Anamalai Tiger Reserve is stable. We found the double-observer survey method to be appropriate for population estimation and long-term monitoring of this species, and make recommendations for improved field protocols to facilitate the implementation of the method in the tropical mountains of the Western Ghats. Our findings suggest that the Reserve harbours 20–25% of the global population of the Nilgiri tahr, highlighting the area's importance for the conservation of this species.

Mycetoma is a chronic granulomatous, suppurative and progressive inflammatory disease that usually involves the subcutaneous tissue and bones after traumatic inoculation of the causative organism. In India, actinomycotic mycetoma is prevalent in south India, south-east Rajasthan and Chandigarh, while eumycetoma, which constitutes one third of the total cases, is mainly reported from north India and central Rajasthan. The objective was to determine the epidemiological profile and spectrum of eumycetoma from a tertiary care hospital in Delhi, North India. Thirty cases of eumycetoma were diagnosed by conventional methods of direct microscopy, culture and species-specific sequencing as per standard protocol. The spectrum of fungal pathogens included Exophiala jeanselmei, Madurella mycetomatis, Fusarium solani, Sarocladium kiliense, Acremonium blochii, Aspergillus nidulans, Fusarium incarnatum, Scedosporium apiospermum complex, Curvularia lunata and Medicopsis romeroi. Eumycetoma can be treated with antifungal therapy and needs to be combined with surgery. It has good prognosis if it is timely diagnosed and the correct species identified by culture for targeted therapy of these patients. Black moulds required prolonged therapy. Its low reporting and lack of familiarity may predispose patients to misdiagnosis and consequently delayed treatment. Hence health education and awareness campaign on the national and international level in the mycetoma belt is crucial.

Over the past three years, my colleagues and I have embarked on an exciting journey into electric-field control of magnetism, parts of which we describe in this article. What we present to you is something that we believe is extremely exciting from both a fundamental science and applications perspective, and has the potential to revolutionize our world. Needless to say, this will require a lot of new innovations, both in the fundamental science arena as well as translating scientific discoveries into real applications. We hope this article will help spur more research in electric-field control of magnetism within the broad materials community.

The coronal field typically reorganizes itself to attain a force-free field configuration. We have evaluated the power law index of the energy distribution f(E) = f0E−α by using a model of relaxation incorporating different profile functions of winding number distribution f(w) based on braided topologies. We study the radio signatures that occur in the solar corona using the radio data obtained from the Gauribidanur Radio Observatory (IIA) and extract the power law index by using the Statistic-sensitive nonlinear iterative peak clipping (SNIP) algorithm. We see that the power law index obtained from the model is in good agreement with the calculated value from the radio data observation.

The flora of Laos remains one of the least known within the Indo-Burma biodiversity hotspot. A floristic inventory was carried out in Phou Hin Poun National Biodiversity Conservation Area, an under-explored area of the Khammouane Limestone. This study provides a list of 27 taxa that are additions to the most recent country checklists. The Ebenaceae, Euphorbiaceae and Myrtaceae are the families with the highest species number. In this list, four species are endemic to Indochina (Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam): Cynometra dongnaiensis Pierre, Jasminum vidalii P.S.Green, Memecylon chevalieri Guillaumin and Pothos gigantipes Buchet ex P.C.Boyce. These results illustrate the paucity of our knowledge of the region surveyed and of the flora of Laos in general.

Multifunctional, complex oxides capable of exhibiting highly-coupled electrical, mechanical, thermal, and magnetic susceptibilities have been pursued to address a range of salient technological challenges. Today, efforts are focused on addressing the pressing needs of a range of applications and identifying, understanding, and controlling materials with the potential for enhanced or novel responses. In this prospective, we highlight important developments in theoretical and computational techniques, materials synthesis, and characterization techniques. We explore how these new approaches could revolutionize our ability to discover, probe, and engineer these materials and provide a context for new arenas where these materials might make an impact.

Underwater position data is a key requirement for the navigation and control of unmanned underwater vehicles. The proposed navigation scheme can be used in any vessel or boat for any shallow water vehicle. This paper presents the position estimation algorithm developed for shallow water Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) using attitude data and Doppler Velocity Log data with the initial position from the Global Positioning System (GPS). The navigational sensors are identified using the in-house developed simulation tool in MATLAB, based on the requirement of a position accuracy of less than 5%. The navigation system is built using the identified sensors, Kalman filter and navigation algorithm, developed in LabVIEW software. The developed system is tested and validated for position estimation, with an emulator consisting of a GPS-aided fibre optic gyro-based inertial navigation system as a reference, and it is found that the developed navigation system has a position error of less than 5%.

Zero Valent Iron nanoparticles (nZVI) were synthesized and immobilized on electrospun carbon nanofibers (ECNFs) surface in a controllable manner through redox reaction. The novel nanomaterial, ECNFs-supported nZVI (nZVI@ECNFs), were evaluated for Cr(VI) ions removal from water for the first time. nZVI@ECNFs outperformed stand-alone nZVI as well as state-of-the-art nZVI research for Cr(VI) remediation in water. nZVI@ECNFs with 0.4 g/L nZVI loading could remove 100% Cr(VI) from 50 mg/L Cr(VI) aqueous solution in as little as 5 min at pH = 4. This is enabled by coupling nanofibrous form ECNFs with dispersed distribution of individual and/or cluster nZVI on surface of ECNFs. It is envisioned that nZVI@CNFs is going to serve as a novel supported nZVI nanomaterial for super-fast heavy metal remediation in ground water and waste water treatment with adjustable high capacity as well as straightforward and energy-saving heavy metal recovery.

Core collections are the integral part of biotechnology-aided modern-day crop improvement programmes and utilized for a variety of applications including conventional plant breeding, association mapping, resequencing, among others. Since their advent, determination of core collection size has been based on the size of the whole collection. In this study, we precisely estimated the size of the core collection based on the diversity of the whole collection using the Similarity Elimination method. For each of the elimination cycle, allele retention and pairwise and mean genetic distances were calculated and used as the criteria for the precise estimation of the core collection size. We sampled a coconut core collection with 266 entries by retaining the diversity of the whole collection. During the elimination process, accessions with very rare alleles were eliminated first when compared with those having rare and common alleles. Therefore, our results support the hypothesis that the less frequent alleles seldom contribute to the genetic distance when compared with common alleles. In conclusion, presize can be efficiently utilized in any crop for the precise estimation of core collection size.

Unsteady aerofoil flows are often characterized by leading-edge vortex (LEV) shedding. While experiments and high-order computations have contributed to our understanding of these flows, fast low-order methods are needed for engineering tasks. Classical unsteady aerofoil theories are limited to small amplitudes and attached leading-edge flows. Discrete-vortex methods that model vortex shedding from leading edges assume continuous shedding, valid only for sharp leading edges, or shedding governed by ad-hoc criteria such as a critical angle of attack, valid only for a restricted set of kinematics. We present a criterion for intermittent vortex shedding from rounded leading edges that is governed by a maximum allowable leading-edge suction. We show that, when using unsteady thin aerofoil theory, this leading-edge suction parameter (LESP) is related to the $\def \xmlpi #1{}\def \mathsfbi #1{\boldsymbol {\mathsf {#1}}}\let \le =\leqslant \let \leq =\leqslant \let \ge =\geqslant \let \geq =\geqslant \def \Pr {\mathit {Pr}}\def \Fr {\mathit {Fr}}\def \Rey {\mathit {Re}}A_0$ term in the Fourier series representing the chordwise variation of bound vorticity. Furthermore, for any aerofoil and Reynolds number, there is a critical value of the LESP, which is independent of the motion kinematics. When the instantaneous LESP value exceeds the critical value, vortex shedding occurs at the leading edge. We have augmented a discrete-time, arbitrary-motion, unsteady thin aerofoil theory with discrete-vortex shedding from the leading edge governed by the instantaneous LESP. Thus, the use of a single empirical parameter, the critical-LESP value, allows us to determine the onset, growth, and termination of LEVs. We show, by comparison with experimental and computational results for several aerofoils, motions and Reynolds numbers, that this computationally inexpensive method is successful in predicting the complex flows and forces resulting from intermittent LEV shedding, thus validating the LESP concept.

The secret art of silk culture along with mulberry seeds is presumed to have spread from China to other parts of the world including India through the famous Silk Road. In this study, we investigated a set of 36 important mulberry genotypes (designated as ‘breeders’ collection’) of historical importance that have been frequently used in Indian crop improvement programmes over the last five decades. This study is the first to employ a large number of microsatellite markers (140 screened; 70 used for profiling) to elucidate the diversity, structure and breeding history of mulberry. The cluster and STRUCTURE analysis corroborated with the known genetic relationships and origin. The groupings by STRUCTURE (k= 4) confirm parallel breeding efforts undertaken in the eastern, southern and northern regions of the country. The cultivar ‘Mysore Local’ shares a common parent with ‘Berhampore Local’, and this supports the historical records of its introduction from eastern India to the Kingdom of Mysore by the erstwhile ruler Tippu Sultan. The popular variety ‘Kanva-2’ shared a common male parent with the Japanese variety ‘Kousen’, supporting the contribution of exotic progenitors in Indian cultivars. The findings of this study will be useful in formulating new strategies for mulberry improvement and reveals the historical events of the introduction and spread of cultivated mulberry in the Indian subcontinent.

Extended abstract of a paper presented at Microscopy and Microanalysis 2013 in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA, August 4 – August 8, 2013.

Extended abstract of a paper presented at Microscopy and Microanalysis 2013 in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA, August 4 – August 8, 2013.