Competitive adsorption behavior of selected heavy metals in three soil types of India amended with fly ash and sewage sludge

Laboratory batch experiments were carried out to study the competitive sorption behavior of metals in three types of Indian soils, differing in their physicochemical properties: acid laterite (SL1), red alfisol (SL2) and black vertisol (SL3) treated with different proportions of fly ash and sewage sludge mixture. Representative samples were equilibrated with 10 to 200 µM L ^-1 concentrations of metals simultaneously containing Cd, Cu, Ni, Pb and Zn in 5 mM of Ca(NO ₃) ₂ solution. In most of the cases the affinity sequence of metals was Pb>Cu>Zn>Ni>Cd based on their amount of sorption, which varied little with either metal equilibrating concentrations or the soil/mixture type. The observed metal affinity sequences in different soils amended with mixtures were compared to the predicted affinity sequences based on metal properties and a good match was found with those predicted by metal hydrolysis constants. This indicated that formation and subsequent sorption of metal hydrolysis products on soil surface is the predominant mechanism for sorption. In all the cases, Pb and Cu showed higher affinity followed by Zn, Ni or Cd. The increase in the metal additions further enhanced the competition among metals for exchange sites. Adsorption isotherms showed that metal sorption was linearly related to its concentration in the equilibrium solution. The distribution coefficients (K _D) computed from the slopes of linear regression for different metals were higher in SL3 than in both SL2 and SL1. All the mixture amended soils produced higher K _D values than their respective controls. Selectivity between metals resulted in the following affinities based on their K _D values—Pb>Cu>Zn>Ni or Cd—which was in line with the value of the hydrolysis constant of the metals under study.     

Mobility and bioavailability of selected heavy metals in coal ash- and sewage sludge-amended acid soil

A sequential extraction procedure has been used to study the changes in the distribution and mobility of Cd, Cr, Cu, Ni, Pb and Zn in an acid lateritic soil amended with alkaline coal ash and neutral sludge individually and with their mixture of equal proportions at 25, 50 and 75 Mg/ha application rates and grown in a crop with peanuts. A separate set of experiments consisting of the same treatments was repeated with the addition of lime at 2 Mg/ha. Increases in total heavy-metal levels with application of various amendments were mainly associated with increases in the insoluble and less mobile forms of metals except for Cd, which showed an increase in its exchangeable form. An increase in pH of the amended soil restricted the metal mobility in their labile forms and was more pronounced after liming the treatments. Positive yield responses were observed in the amended soil, the magnitude being higher in only sludge-applied treatments. The vegetative plant parts showed maximum accumulation of metals indicating a physiological barrier in the transfer of metals from the root to the kernel. Linear relationships of total concentrations of heavy metals in soil with that in the crop were observed. Lime addition to the treatments further reduced the transfer and accumulation of metals from the soil to the plant, even though the relationship remained linear.     

Climbing ripple structure and associated storm-lamination from a Proterozoic carbonate platform succession: Their environmental and petrogenetic significance

The Mesoproterozoic Pandikunta Limestone, a shallow water carbonate platform succession in the Pranhita-Godavari Valley, south India, displays well developed climbing ripple lamination and storm deposited structures, such as HCS, wave ripple-lamination, combined-flow ripple-lamination and low angle trough cross-stratification. Different types of stratification developed in calcisiltite with minor amounts of very fine quartz sand and silt. The climbing ripple structures exhibit a complex pattern of superposition of different types (type A, B and S) within cosets pointing to a fluctuating rate of suspension depositionversus bedform migration, and an unsteady character of the flow. Close association of climbing ripple structures, HCS with anisotropic geometry, wavy lamination and combined-flow ripple-lamination suggest that the structures were formed by storm generated combined-flow in a mid-shelf area above the storm wave base. The combined-flow that deposited the climbing ripple structures had a strong unidirectional flow component of variable magnitude. The climbing ripple structure occurs as a constituent of graded stratified beds with an ordered vertical sequence of different types of lamination, reflecting flow deceleration and increased rate of suspension deposition. It is inferred that the beds were deposited from high-density waning flows in the relatively deeper part of the ancient shelf. The structures indicate that the Pandikunta platform was subjected to open marine circulation and intense storm activities. The storm deposited beds, intercalated with beds of lime-mudstone, consist primarily of fine sand and silt size carbonate particles that were hydrodynamically similar to quartz silt. Detrital carbonate particles are structureless and are of variable roundness. The particles were generated as primary carbonate clasts in coastal areas by mechanical disintegration of rapidly lithified beds, stromatolites or laminites, and the finest grade was transported to the offshore areas by storm-generated currents.     

Small Amplitude Nonlinear Dust Acoustic Wave Propagation in Saturn's F, G and E Rings

Nonlinear properties of small amplitude dust acoustic waves, incorporatingboth the ion inertial effect and dust drift effect have been studied.The effect of dust charge variation is also incorporated. It is seen thatdue to the dust charge variation, a Korteweg-de Vries (KdV) equationwith positive or negative damping term depending on the wave velocityand the ring parameters governes the nonlinear dust acoustic wave. It isseen that the damping or growth arises due to the assumption that dusthydrodynamical time scale is much smaller than that of the dust chargingscale. This assumption is valid only for planetary rings such as Saturn'sF, G and E rings. Numerical investigations reveal thatall the three rings in F, G and E, dust acoustic solitary wave admits both negative and positive potentials. Instability arises from the available freeenergy of drift motion of dust grains only for the wave with wave velocity 0, the drift velocity of the dust.     

Joint Pattern in Precambrian Rocks Around Galudih (India): Implications for Fold Mechanism

In this paper, analysis of joints developed in folded quartzites of Galudih area, Jharkhand State (India) is presented. The joint pattern indicates that NE–SW joints are the dominant set. These have developed perpendicular to the NW–SE trending axial planes and hinges of the folds in quartzites implying that they are cross-joints. Plumose structures are observed on NE–SW joint surfaces that indicate their formation by extension perpendicular to the joint face. It is inferred that this extension in NW-SE direction is related to NE–SW compressional stresses that resulted in folding of the quartzite by flexural-slip mechanism.     

Mode‐acceleration approach to seismic response of multiply‐supported secondary systems

A mode‐acceleration approach has been proposed for estimating the seismic response of a linear, classically‐damped, multiply‐supported secondary system within the framework of a power spectral density function (PSDF)‐based stochastic approach, while the primary system is linear and classically‐damped. Response transfer functions have been formulated in terms of chosen numbers of fixed‐base modes of the primary and secondary systems. The proposed approach does not involve the determination of combined system properties, and is applicable to the secondary systems with high mass ratios also. Through a few example primary–secondary systems and an example band‐limited white noise excitation, it has been shown that this approach leads to reasonably accurate results when only a few primary and secondary modes are to be considered. The proposed formulation has been used to obtain input data for a decoupled response spectrum analysis of secondary systems. This data accurately accounts for the effects of interaction between the primary and secondary systems. It is shown to lead to substantial reductions in the errors associated with the envelope spectrum method in the case of moderately heavy to heavy secondary systems and when the spatial coupling does not play a major role. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Rare earth elements in Silurian pelitic schists from N.W. Maine

Thirty-two samples of a series of metamorphosed Silurian (?) pelitic schists in the greenschist and amphibolite facies from N.W. Maine have been analyzed for their rare-earth element (REE) content. The REE contents of these samples do not change as a function of metamorphic grade. Two different metasedimentary formations have been sampled, and they differ significantly in their light REE content. The absolute and relative distribution of the REE in the Bangeley Formation are quite similar to the composites of N. American, European and Russian shales that have been determined thus far (e.g. median La/Lu ratio of the Bangeley Formation normalized to chondrites = 8.7 ± 3.0). Samples from the Perry Mt. Formation show large depletions in the light REE compared to the Bangeley Formation and previously analyzed shale and metamorphosed shale samples, but heavy REE concentrations that are quite similar to the other samples (e.g. median La/Lu ratio of the Perry Mt. normalized to chondrites = 1.2 ± 0.6). These differences in light REE content between the Perry Mt. Formation and other sedimentary rocks are probably due to differences in the original clay mineral compositions as modified by weathering and/or depositional environments.     

Torsion of a non-homogeneous solid of revolution

Summary Solution has been obtained in the case of torsion of a solid of revolution of non-homogeneous material. The problem of a twisted sphere has been deduced from the general solution. The effect of non-homogeneity has been illustrated graphically.     

A Context-Sensitive Clustering Technique Based on Graph-Cut Initialization and Expectation-Maximization Algorithm

This letter presents a multistage clustering technique for unsupervised classification that is based on the following: 1) a graph-cut procedure to produce initial segments that are made up of pixels with similar spatial and spectral properties; 2) a fuzzy c-means algorithm to group these segments into a fixed number of classes; 3) a proper implementation of the expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm to estimate the statistical parameters of classes on the basis of the initial seeds that are achieved at convergence by the fuzzy c-means algorithm; and 4) the Bayes rule for minimum error to perform the final classification on the basis of the distributions that are estimated with the EM algorithm. Experimental results confirm the effectiveness of the proposed technique.     

Temporal variability in the withdrawal phase of southwest monsoon over India and related consequences in northeast monsoon: a climatological perspective

Theoretical and Applied Climatology - The variability in duration of withdrawal phase of southwest monsoon over India is often witnessed to influence the northeast monsoon rainfall of India as...