Clay mineralogy of the ocean sediments from the Wilkes Land margin,east Antarctica: implications on the paleoclimate,provenance and sediment dispersal pattern

Core U1359 collected from the continental rise off Wilkes Land, east Antarctica, is analyzed for the clay mineralogy and carbon content. The temporal variation of the clay mineralogical data shows a dominance of illite with chlorite, smectite and kaolinite in decreasing concentration. Clay mineral illite is negatively correlated with smectite which shows enrichment during 6.2–6.8, 5.5–5.8, 4.5 and 2.5 Ma. The mineralogical analyses on the silt size fraction (2–53 μm) of some selected samples were also carried out. The combined result of both the size fractions shows the presence of chlorite and illite in both size fractions, smectite and kaolinite only in clay size fraction (<2 μm) and similarity in the crystallinity and chemistry of illite in both fractions. Similar nature of illite in both fractions suggests negligible role of sorting probably due to the deposition from the waxing ice sheet. During times of ice growth, nearby cratonic east Antarctica shield provided biotite-rich sediments to the depositional site. On the other hand, the presence of smectite, only in the clay size fraction, suggests the effective role of sorting probably due to the deposition from distal source in ice retreat condition. During times of ice retreat, smectite-rich sediment derived from Ross Orogen is transported to the core site through surface or bottom water currents. Poor crystallinity of illite due to degradation further corroborates the ice retreat condition. The ice sheet proximal sediments of U1359 show that in the eastern part of Wilkes Land, the ‘warming’ was initiated during late Miocene.     

Signature of the 27-day variation in hemispheric sunspot activity and asymmetry during 2010-2015

In the present work,we study the time evolution,significance of the N-S asymmetry excesses presented as a function of the solar cycle and prominent rotational p...     

Relation between VLF phase deviations and solar X-ray fluxes during solar flares

Sudden phase anomalies (SPA's) observed in the phase of GBR 16 kHz VLF signals during the years 1977 to 1983 have been analysed in the light of their associated solar X-ray fluxes in the 0.5–4 Å and 1–8 Å bands. An attempt has been made to investigate the solar zenith angle () dependence of the integrated solar X-ray flux for producing SPA's. It is deduced from the observations for < 81° that the phase deviation increases linearly as a whole with increasing solar X-ray fluxes in these two bands. The threshold X-ray flux needed to produce a detectable SPA effect has been estimated to be 1.6 × 10^–4 ergcm^–2 s^–1 and 1.8 × 10^–3 ergcm^–2 s^–1 in the 0.5–4 Å and 1–8 Å bands, respectively. For both bands the average cross section for all atmospheric constituents at a height of 70 km is almost equal to the absorption cross section for the 3 Å X-ray emission.     

Diversity, distribution pattern and conservation status of the plants used in liver diseases/ailments in Indian Himalayan Region

Introduction The Indian Himalayan Region (IHR) is known for its unique, natural, representative biodiversity (Samant et al. 1998a). This biodiversity is being utilized by the inhabitants of the IHR in various forms, i.e., medicine, food (wild edibles), fuel, fodder, timber, making agricultural tools, fiber, religious and various other purposes (Samant and Dhar 1997, Samant et al. 1998b). In the remote areas of the IHR where primary health centers are located far from the villages, the in…     

A class of exact isotropic solutions of Einstein’s equations and relativistic stellar models in general relativity

In this paper we have studied a particular class of exact solutions of Einstein’s gravitational field equations for spherically symmetric and static perfect fluid distribution in isotropic coordinates. The Schwarzschild compactness parameter, GM/c ² R, can attain the maximum value 0.1956 up to which the solution satisfies the elementary tests of physical relevance. The solution also found to have monotonic decreasing adiabatic sound speed from the centre to the boundary of the fluid sphere. A wide range of fluid spheres of different mass and radius for a given compactness is possible. The maximum mass of the fluid distribution is calculated by using stellar surface density as parameter. The values of different physical variables obtained for some potential strange star candidates like Her X-1, 4U 1538–52, LMC X-4, SAX J1808.4?3658 given by our analytical model demonstrate the astrophysical significance of our class of relativistic stellar models in the study of internal structure of compact star such as self-bound strange quark star.     

Einstein–Maxwell Field Equation in Isotropic Coordinates: An Application to Modeling Superdense Star

We present a charged analogue of Pant et al. (2010, Astrophys. Space Sci., 330, 353) solution of the general relativistic field equations in isotropic coordinates by using simple form of electric intensity E that involve charge parameter K. Our solution is well behaved in all respects for all values of X lying in the range 0 <X≤ 0.11, K lying in the range 4 <K≤ 6.2 and Schwarzschild compactness parameter u lying in the range 0 <u≤ 0.247. Since our solution is well behaved for wide ranges of the parameters, we can model many different types of ultra-cold compact stars like quark stars and neutron stars. We have shown that corresponding to X = 0.077 and K = 6.13 for which u = 0.2051 and by assuming surface density ρ _b =4.6888×10¹⁴ g cm ^?3 the mass and radius are found to be 1.509M _⊙, 10.906 km respectively which match with the observed values of mass 1.51M _⊙ and radius 10.90 km of the quark star XTE J1739-217. The well behaved class of relativistic stellar models obtained in this work might have astrophysical significance in the study of more realistic internal structures of compact stars.     

Well-behaved relativistic charged super-dense star models

A new class of charged super-dense star models is obtained by using an electric intensity, which involves a parameter, K. The metric describing the model shares its metric potential g ₄₄ with that of Durgapal’s fourth solution (J. Phys. A, Math. Gen. 15:2637, 1982). The pressure-free surface is kept at the density ρ _b =2×10¹⁴ g/cm³ and joins smoothly with the Reissner-Nordstrom solution. The charge analogues are well-behaved for a wide range, 0≤K≤59, with the optimum value of X=0.264 i.e. the pressure, density, pressure–density ratio and velocity of sound are monotonically decreasing and the electric intensity is monotonically increasing in nature for the given range of the parameter K. The maximum mass and the corresponding radius occupied by the neutral solution are 4.22M _Θ and 20 km, respectively for X=0.264. For the charged solution, the maximum mass and radius are defined by the expressions M≈(0.0059K+4.22)M _Θ and r _b ≈−0.021464K+20 km respectively.     

Two-Fluid Bianchi Type II Cosmological Models

In this paper we present a class of solutions of Einstein's field equations describing two-fluid models of the universe in a locally rotationally symmetric Bianchi type II space-time. In these models one fluid is the radiation distribution which represents the cosmic microwave background and the other fluid is the perfect fluid representing the matter content of the universe. It is found that both the fluids are comoving in the locally rotationally symmetric Bianchi type II space-time. The behaviour of the radiation density, matter density, the ratio of the matter density to the radiation density and the pressure has been discussed. A subclass of solutions is found to describe models of a spatially homogeneous and partially isotropic universe evolving from a radiation dominated era to a pressure free matter dominated era. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Well behaved class of charge analogue of Heintzmann’s relativistic exact solution

We present a well behaved class of Charge Analogue of Heintzmann (Z. Phys. 228:489, 1969) solution. This solution describes charge fluid balls with positively finite central pressure and positively finite central density ; their ratio is less than one and causality condition is obeyed at the centre. The outmarch of pressure, density, pressure-density ratio and the adiabatic speed of sound is monotonically decreasing, however, the electric intensity is monotonically increasing in nature. The solution gives us wide range of constant K (1.25≤K≤15) for which the solution is well behaved and therefore, suitable for modeling of super dense star. For this solution the mass of a star is maximized with all degrees of suitability and by assuming the surface density ρ _b =2×10¹⁴ g/cm³. Corresponding to K=1.25 and X=0.42, the maximum mass of the star comes out to be 3.64M _Θ with linear dimension 24.31 km and central redshift 1.5316.