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The article focuses on the chemical composition of birch bark and its use as a historic writing material. The use of birch bark has been prevalent in ancient northern India, Nepal, central Asia and north-east Europe. Birch bark consists of mainly organic constituents. Birch bark contains little cellulose but good amount of waxes and oil making it highly resistant towards deterioration. The presence of lignin and rosin in the birch bark makes it quite acidic.

As the exhaust rate of the conventional sources has geared up already, this is compelling the power industries to install the power plants based on the non-conventional sources so that future demand of the energy supply can be fulfilled. Among the various sources of renewable energy like wind, hydro, tidal etc., solar energy is the most easily accessible and available renewable energy source. Ensuring the feasibility of any energy source not only technical but also the economical perspective is the most important criteria. This paper has incorporated both the perspective and has done the techno-economic analysis to determine the optimum combination of the PV array size and battery size to minimize the overall electricity generation per unit. In this paper, a standalone solar PV system has been analyzed for the location of Jamshedpur, where an effort has been done to choose the optimum combination of the solar array and battery size within the desired range of LLP so that the electricity generation cost per unit can be minimized. The overall duration of the analysis has been done for a year and the outcome of the research has been verified with the help of MATLAB software. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As COVID-19 spread through India, Civil Society Organizations (CSO)s mobilized resources to support the efforts of the Government by playing the role of an active partner in providing social and economic welfare to the affected population. This paper aims to provide a concise overview of the response of civil society to the pandemic situation at the grassroots and policy level. Further, the authors discuss the paradox in demonstrated efficiency and commitment of civil society, which follows a crackdown on civil society organizations by the state through silencing voices of dissent and regulating the shrinking civic space. The strained relationship between the government and civil society organizations in India is also examined against the backdrop of draconian legislation and policies framed during the time of COVID-19, proscribing debate, review or consultations. In the context of the pandemic and the subsequent phase of recovery, such actions of the Government will have deleterious effects on the relationship of trust between civil society and the state. Through this paper, the authors argue for a more tolerant and co-operative approach to the functions of civil society organizations by the Government, thus effectively reducing mistrust and suspicion in the intentions of the state. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The power system oscillations in the grid are an issue of concern to the system operator. They may transform a stable system into an unstable system when the system is operating on the edge and contingency occurs. The oscillations developed in the system may grow and spread across the power grid if no timely, corrective action is taken to mitigate them. The paper presents the ultra-mega power plant generation complex related blackout analysis. The case study presented in this paper demonstrates the utilization of synchrophasor data to have a better realization about the grid disturbance. It covers some of the important dynamic simulation studies considered representative of various scenarios during this. The paper illustrates utilization of Prony analysis using multiple signals and Fast Fourier Transform methods in conjunction with frequency data obtained in real-time from PMUs installed in the western regional grid of India to determine the frequency of oscillations, its magnitude, and related damping during this disturbance. The focus of this study involves the application of these techniques to gain insight into the oscillatory behavior of the system during this disturbance associated with ultra-mega power plant having generation capacity greater than or equal to 4000 MW from the western part of Indian grid. Based on this, distinct categorization of oscillations into "local mode" and "inter-area mode" of oscillations was done for enhanced understanding about the type of oscillations getting excited during this disturbance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coastal lagoons are high value productive and important systems for different projects. For example, aquaculture, fisheries and tourism are few of them. The quality of coastal waters in the ecosystems of lagoons can be greatly influenced by the growth of unwanted elements, e.g., excessive fisheries, tourism, etc. In this paper, a mathematical model is proposed and analysed to study the general and simplified form of an ecosystem of Chilika Lake, India. Chilika Lake (19°28′N–19°54′N and 85°06′E–85°36′E) is the largest wintering ground for migrating water fowl found anywhere on the Indian sub-continent. These migratory birds utilize the Chilika Lake for feeding, resting and breeding. The interaction of birds and small fish in the Chilika Lake is considered to be Leslie–Gower Holling type II. Since big fish are being sourced as income for local fishermen and the population of big fish is highly variable, and hence birds and small fishes are mainly the two types of biomass considered for this study. It must be noted that, in this study, we have considered the case of Chilika lake theoretically only and no practical data is collected for this study, and the name of Chilika is used only for better ecological understanding. Therefore, this theoretical study maybe linked to any such ecosystem. Their interaction is found mathematically, a two-dimensional continuous-time dynamical system modeling a simple predator–prey food chain. The dynamical system is represented in the form of two nonlinear coupled ordinary differential equation (ODE) systems. The main mathematical results are given in terms of boundedness of solutions, existence of equilibria, local and global stability of the coexisting interior point. An ecosystem in Indian coastal lagoons may suffer immediate environmental perturbations, such as depressions, tropical cyclones, earthquakes, epidemics, etc. To model such situations, the ODE model is further extended to a stochastic model driven by L e ́ $\check{d}{e}$ vy noise. The stochastic analysis includes the existence of the unique global solution, stability in mean, and extinction of the population. The proposed model is numerically simulated with the help of an assumed set of parameters for the possible pictorial behavior of the theoretical model. The proposed model may be used for planning purposes by using the data on meteorological and weather shocks such as heavy rainfall, heat-waves, cold-waves, depressions, tropical cyclones, earthquakes, etc. from India Meteorological Department (IMD). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to demonstrate the implications of health mobility on language practices in the medical tourism industry in India and on the ways, language workers become entrepreneurs. Drawing from ethnographic fieldwork that traces the trajectories of three former students of Russian, we highlight their future aspirations as language learners and entrepreneurs and show, how they attempt to capitalize on language skills and respond to changing conditions and patient movements within the structures, constraints and uncertainties of the linguistic market. Here, it is our aim to illustrate what it takes to become an enterprising and successful language worker and at the same time highlight their current positioning as emblematic yet subordinate figures within a fast-growing service industry in an emerging economy. We further demonstrate, how language skills not only become commodities to serve existing or future markets, but instead are recast as tools that can be strategically employed to secure recognition and access to prestigious and lucrative professional networks. In doing so, this paper illustrates how linguistic value is produced in a service industry that to date only received little attention in sociolinguistic research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses pigments used in Indian palm leaf manuscripts. Formerly it was believed that pigments for palm leaf illustrations were mostly sourced from plant extracts – a believe that is still widespread in India. This paper reports the identification of pigments of an illustrated palm leaf manuscript (eighteenth – nineteenth century) collected from the east coast of India. As Raman spectra of many pigments gave too high background noise, the identification was mostly accomplished through SEM-EDX and FTIR spectroscopy. The analytical findings indicated that both mineral colours and plant extracts were sourced for Indian palm-leaf manuscripts. Analysis indicated the use of lamp black for black, indigo for blue, vermillion for red, orpiment for yellow, china clay for white and a mixture of orpiment and indigo for green coloration in the illustrations. The data has improved our knowledge of historic pigments used in palm leaf illustrations. As some of the pigments are either photosensitive or darken due to atmospheric pollution, necessary preventive conservation measures need to be adopted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Eastern Regional (ER) grid of India is one of the five regional grids consisting of voltage level 765 kV, 400 kV, 220 kV and numerous buses at lower voltage range. ER grid is the backbone of the Indian Grid as it is one of the main power generating hubs. Stability of the Indian Grid depends a lot on ER grid as it is the core of the generation and transmission system. For performing stability studies and to determine the weak area of the grid generally L-Index method is used. For detailed analysis like computation of voltage recovery time, maximum frequency deviation and critical clearing time of the buses of the system L-Index method is not suitable. Hence dynamic simulation is performed as it provides options to compute various parameters of ER Grid. The system has been studied using 197 buses of voltage levels 220 kV and above and transmission lines running over a length of 23,693 km. In this paper the power flow modelling, simulation and analysis of the Eastern Grid of India is performed. L-Index algorithm along with dynamic simulation provides the scope of computation of voltage recovery time, maximum frequency deviation and critical clearing time (by introducing an initial transient disturbance) along with the prediction of weak area of the system which gives a complete picture of transient stability of ER Grid. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The advances in Wide Area Measurement Systems (WAMS) and deployment of a huge number of phasor measurement units (PMUs) in the grid are generating big data volume. This data can be used for a variety of applications related to grid monitoring, management, operation, protection, and control. With the increase in this data size, the respective storage capacity needs to be enhanced. Also, communication infrastructure readiness remains bottleneck to transfer this big data. One of the probable solutions could be transmitting compressed data. This paper presents techniques for data compression in the smart transmission system using singular values decomposition (SVD) and the eigenvalues decomposition (EVD). The SVD and EVD based principal component analysis (PCA) techniques are applied to the real-time PMU data collected from extra-high voltage (EHV) substations of transmission utility in the western regional grid of India. Adequacy of data is checked by Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin (KMO) test in order to have the satisfactory performance of these techniques towards achieving the objective of efficient data compression. Results are found satisfactory gives compression more than 80% using real time data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents optimal power flow management in real time for grid connected photovoltaic (PV)–battery system. The objective is the real time, dynamic and optimal scheduling of battery storage which reduces grid power consumption and achieves the peak load shaving. For this purpose, two strategies are developed; one is rule-based and other is optimization algorithm based. Two strategies are compared, pros and cons of those strategies are established. Though rule-based technique is simple & easy to implement, the optimization technique provides more optimal regulation of battery which provides the lesser electricity cost. Forecasted PV/load powers are used to get optimal value of battery power. In order to handle uncertainties due to forecasted data, fuzzy-based corrective strategy is developed to modify the reference battery power as per the present values of PV/load powers. The proposed analysis is carried out for over one exemplary day. The simulations are presented using typical load/PV data of India and Finland as a part of research collaboration. Experimental results are also carried out using proposed scheme. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper investigates the alterations in ionospheric Total Electron Content (TEC) over a low latitude location Bangalore (Geographic latitude 12.9 ∘ N {12.9^{\circ }}\hspace{2.38387pt}\text{N} and longitude 77.6 ∘ E {77.6^{\circ }}\hspace{2.38387pt}\text{E} ; Geomagnetic latitude 4. 5 ∘ N 4.{5^{\circ }}\hspace{2.38387pt}\text{N}) in India, corresponding to the new Moon and full Moon days which are associated with abnormality in the eastward Equatorial Electrojet (EEJ) currents. It has been well established that even during certain geomagnetic quiet days, the EEJ current direction is reversed, resulting in a westward electrojet current called Counter Electrojet (CEJ) which is more prominent around the new Moon and full Moon days, favored by Sun–Moon–Earth alignments and lunar orbital characteristics. The Global Positioning System (GPS) derived TEC at Bangalore is investigated for full Moon and new Moon and their adjacent days during the period 2008–2015. The presence of CEJ during these days suggests the foremost role of driving EEJ current over the equator in the alterations of spatiotemporal distributions of TEC over the low latitude region. The deviations in quiet time TEC during new Moon and full Moon days are quantified in this study that may give a thrust towards modeling of lunar tidal effects in the flipped ionospheric parameter over the Indian region. The study would also support analysis of future solar eclipse effects on ionosphere those involve additional photoionization production/recombination processes corresponding to the passage of lunar shadow and cooling effects. Moreover, the results underpin modeling and mitigation of ionospheric error in the satellite-based positioning, navigation, and communication applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

More than 70 % bleached chemical pulp is produced in India through elemental chlorine-free bleaching in which chlorine-based compounds like chlorine dioxide is a dominant chemical which generates chlorinated organic toxins harmful to the environment. Present studies demonstrate short sequence of bleaching combined with acid treatment, followed by pressurized oxygen delignification. It was found that efficiency of oxygen improved by adding hydrogen peroxide as an additive in oxygen delignification with subsequent treatment with ozone or chlorine dioxide as bleaching agents. It was observed that by using additive in ODL process, pulp can achieve 70±1 (%ISO) brightness. Reduction attains in kappa number 65–70 % as compared to 45–50 % in control oxygen delignification stage. Through AOpZ and AOpD bleaching sequences, full brightness achieved 84–85 (%ISO) without considerable loss in mechanical strength properties compared to DEpD sequence. A potential reduction in COD, color, and AOX was 28, 53.3, and 88 % respectively were observed in AOpZ short bleaching sequence compared to DEpD bleaching. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Information technology has brought a tremendous change in the nature, boundaries and structure of information. The ongoing movement towards an electronic information society is pushing libraries towards automation and digitization. The revolution has brought impressive changes in the role of LIS professionals who are now being viewed as information managers/facilitators. These developments have also influenced LIS writings and publishing. This study shows that while the application of IT has gained considerable importance in Indian libraries, IT-based papers have surprisingly found less space in Indian LIS periodicals as compared to the LIS literature in general. The findings of this study also indicate that there is an uneven distribution of various topics within the Indian LIS IT-published literature; while some topics/areas of IT have received considerable attention others have been barely touched. Topics like IT in general, bibliographic databases, library networking, library automation and electronic resources have been found to predominate in the growth of Indian LIS literature as compared to the coverage of other areas of IT. Most papers (60%) have single authors, indicating a low amount of teamwork/collaborative writing. The paper's analysis also reveals that working professionals/librarians have made more contributions (48%) in comparison to teaching professionals (22%). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses a 2004 destructive incident at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute (BORI) in Pune, India as a case study to discuss the intersection of caste politics, ownership, and violence in the archives. After a brief overview of the events leading up to, during, and subsequent to the violent destruction of archival documents by an angry lower caste mob, this paper provides the historical context necessary to analyze issues of ownership, politics, and colonialism within the context of a South Asian library, keeping in mind the complex interplay of religion, region, and caste in India. The paper then explores this incident from an archival studies perspective, looking at archives as both sites of violence and as cultural and political symbols, and explores how issues of ownership, political pressure, and access, if not properly addressed, can boil over into violent destruction of the archival record. Finally, this paper argues that violent incidents such as the one described can occur outside of the Indian context, in almost any archival setting, and concludes with recommendations on how to avoid future destruction in archival repositories. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Electromagnetic interference is becoming an increasing concern, because of the high intensity of surrounding electromagnetic waves, mainly arising from communication signals and also due to widespread use of equipment that operates at radio frequencies. As a consequence, sensitive data acquisition equipment suffers from erroneous results. Operating such instruments in a suitable shielded environment can significantly reduce this electromagnetic interference. But to achieve good shielding in practice, construction-related problems are to be faced, especially in large spaces, where a single metal plate cannot cover the whole area. Unless special care is taken, electromagnetic waves can penetrate\ through the gap in the joints and defects like drill holes reducing the shielding effectiveness. Also, a single layer of shielding is not always effective as the quality deteriorates drastically even due to minor constructional defects as mentioned above. This paper describes real-life experiences, step-by-step, in the shielding of a spacious insulation diagnostic laboratory (with a target of at least 55 dB signal attenuation), firstly using a good conducting material, using two different methods for joining the sheets, and ultimately constructing a second layer of shielding using a magnetic material. To study the attenuation behavior of the laboratory with respect to electromagnetic waves, a device for the relative measurement of surrounding electromagnetic signal strength is developed. The signal levels are measured initially outside and then at different places inside the shielded laboratory. The results presented in this paper show (1) the variation of attenuation characteristics inside the shielded laboratory due to different methods adopted for joining the shielding sheets using a good conducting material, (2) the effect of a second shielding layer in the form of a box that was constructed using a magnetic material and placed inside the laboratory and (3) the improvement in attenuation behavior after the actual construction of the second layer of shielding using a magnetic material. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Availability Based Tariff (ABT) has been implemented in all the regional grids of India for improving grid discipline by frequency dependent pricing. Currently it is limited to short-term energy transactions between the beneficiary States and Central generating stations without the need for negotiations on price or quantum in real time. In the present scenario, Independent Power Producers (IPP), Captive Power Plants (CPP), small Distributed Generation (DG) like mini-turbine, fuel cell, etc., are not considered under ABT. DG units are normally modular in size and they can be placed close to consumers so as to reduce the T&D costs and losses. Hence, they need to be encouraged so as to meet the ever-increasing electricity demands of Indian power sector within the financial constraints. In this paper, impact of IPPs, CPPs and DGs on intra-State ABT is studied. This paper also proposes to study the impact of grid connected DG on network availability and reliability. The improvement in system reliability is studied after evaluating reliability indices like SAIFI, SAIDI, etc., with the inclusion of DG. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The National Electricity Policy (NEP) [], issued by the Government of India, mandates transmission prices to be distance and direction sensitive and capture utilization of the network by each network user. In line with the mandate, the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) [] has issued Sharing of Interstate Transmission Charges and Losses Regulations, 2010 [], to introduce point of connection (PoC)-based transmission pricing methodology in India. The methodology under the above regulations introduces one of the major reforms of its kind in the Indian power sector and seeks to share the total transmission charges in proportion to respective utilization of the transmission system by different entities. In this paper, the authors have enumerated their experience gained from the implementation of PoC-based transmission pricing regime in India. Authors have also discussed various issues encountered in the process of implementation and the methodology adopted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As an example of the niche overlap theories this paper reports grouping pattern, habitat use and overlap by four sympatric ungulate species, Chital ( Axis axis), Sambar ( Rusa unicolor), Nilgai ( Boselaphus tragocamelus) and Goral ( Naemorhedus goral) in Pathri Rao Watershed within Shivalik Ecosystem, India. A length of 384 km of trail walk and 125 permanent circular plots of 10 m radius were used to collect data on group size, age, sex composition and various ecological and topographical factors governing presence/absence of species within the study area. Chital had the highest mean group size (7.74±1.19), followed by Nilgai (5.40±0.88), Goral (2.50±0.54) and Sambar (1.56±0.18). Group size of Chital varied significantly across seasons in comparison to the other sympatric ungulates. Chital used all the available habitat types with significant differential use (F=3.35, p<0.04). Goral and Sambar only used three habitat types with significant differences (Goral F=4.49, p<0.001; Sambar F=10.17, p<0.001). Nilgai used preferentially flat areas. Discriminant functions exceeded the classification accuracy expected by chance at a significant level of 0.01 (Press's Q=131.90>6.63) with overall 52.3% of cases classified correctly. This analysis indicated clear segregation of the four species along the three discriminant functions with total isolation between Nilgai and Goral along the first axis. Niche overlap analysis predicted segregation of habitat use by sympatric species along one or other niche axis which governs continued existence of the sympatric species in the study area. Locations of artificial water holes determine grouping pattern, habitat use and habitat segregation, as expected by other ecological correlates in the study area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the level of development of the information portals of the ten Indian educational Institutes with the largest traffic. The sample of ten institutional portals with the largest traffic was selected according to the figures provided by Alexa Web Information Company and the Webometrics organisation. The information portals of the Institutes were analysed to determine their level of development according to a set of quality indicators. The twenty-one indicators were divided into five main sections: general features, information features, navigation, search system and other features. The analysis was carried out from February to April 2010. The level of development of the information portals was not homogeneous. Of the portals studied, four showed a medium-high level of development; four showed a medium-low level of development; and two showed a low level of development. The indicators may also be useful for analysing the situation in other countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is the outcome of an attempt in mining recorded power system operational data in order to get new insight to practical power system behavior. Data mining, in general, is essentially finding new relations between data sets by analyzing well known or recorded data. In this effort we make use of the recorded data of the Southern regional grid of India. Some interesting relations at the total system level between frequency, total MW/MVAr generation, and average system voltage have been obtained. The aim of this work is to highlight the potential of data mining for power system applications and also some of the concerns that need to be addressed to make such efforts more useful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper the texture profile analysis for the cooked Bori nuggets (traditional Indian food) prepared from black gram batter having different initial moisture content of 62 to 72% (wb) and air incorporation of 14.14 to 18.12% (v/v) is discussed. The initial moisture content and the volume of air incorporation into the batter had significant effect at either 5% or 1% level of significance on the springiness, chewiness, hardness, cohesiveness and gumminess of the cooked nuggets. The optimum initial moisture content of 65.10 to 67.15% (wb) in the batter and air incorporation of 15.91 to 17.23% (v/v) in it are recommended in obtaining the maximum and minimum levels of the response quality parameters. The optimum values of these response parameters would be 0.453, 12.22, 60.31 N, 0.36 and 22.36 for springiness, chewiness, hardness, cohesiveness, and gumminess, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Libraries in India are progressing well in automating house-keeping operations, refining old services and starting fresh ones. There is also an increasing presence of electronic information sources, external and internal, and services based upon them. Libraries have progressively adopted library automation software, CD-ROM databases, and Web access to electronic journals and digital libraries. With each advance in technology the time of the user to retrieve information has shown a drastic reduction. The emergence and increasing availability of the Internet and Web has led to a lot of information outside the library tempting users to depend less on libraries and to explore these alternate routes to fulfill their information needs. The rise in number and variety of information resources and the inability of most libraries to acquire/access them also leaves the libraries less able to meet the needs of clients, forcing the library and staff to shy away from their new roles. Largely a service hi many institutions that does not enjoy the power of research and teaching staff, the plight of library professionals in many of these institutions results in low morale and underperformance. This paper attempts to look into these issues and the cultures and conflicts faced by users, libraries and librarians in academic and research libraries in India. It identifies the library as a service and access centre, managing and enhancing information in a technology-enhanced environment rather than as a mere repository. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At present the Indian Power Sector is seriously considering the optimization of their existing inter-regional transmission links, and also planning to form new inter-regional links. As one of the options, Thyristors Controlled Series Compensation (TCSC) scheme has been implemented recently in the Uttar Pradesh State, in the 400 kV links between Anpara and Unnao, and further efforts have not been made yet. At this stage, as a helping hand to the Power Sector in its decision-making, this paper explores the need for further transmission system upgrading, and based on a prototype transmission system study, it identifies a few more inter-regional transmission links for TCSC implementation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In India, apart from state owned generators, a central sector power pool has been created consisting of central sector power stations. The Central Transmission Utility (CTU) has built an EHV network to transfer this power to the constituents of the regional network. To recover the costs incurred, the CTU levies the Transmission Service Charges (TSC) over the constituents. The constituents are billed for network usage charges which are proportional to their allocated share in the central sector power generation. An ideal pricing mechanism would have been to find out the usage of the network by the constituents and charge accordingly. In this paper, a real power tracing based method for recovery of Transmission Service Charge (TSC) from the constituents of Western regional grid in India is proposed. The method uses proportionality based real power tracing to find out the network usage by various constituents. Loss allocation on EHV network to the various constituents is also done. Actual data of power flows over the EHV network of Western regional grid for one day is considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]