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The coronavirus pandemic paused an incident threat to modern society. The coronavirus pandemic caused shutdown of many life activities including educational activities. One of the most important challenges that human society needs to address is the education of students whose learning was hindered due to coronavirus pandemic. In India about 32 million learners stopped going to schools and colleges. The education system had no choice but to switch to online learning for ensuring the continuity of teaching-learning during pandemic. This chapter talks about technological competencies (i.e., tools) evolved and embraced by educational institutions of India from elementary to tertiary levels. The study also attempts to address learners' attitudes, perceptions, and preferences for online education by means of a survey piloted among K-12 students in Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh, India.

Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles are much desired for various biomedical applications due to their biocompatible, biodegradable and superparamagnetic nature. In contrast to high-temperature synthesis methods, present study investigates the facile low-temperature co-precipitation process without inert atmosphere. For its efficient, homogenous, in core heating and environment friendly nature microwave energy at two powers of 180 and 450 W was used for synthesis and functionalisation of nanoparticles. It was found in the study, that microwave power plays a decisive role in controlling the size, coating and drug loading percentage of the particles. The synthesis process has been made more economic and simpler by the use of domestic oven, and serine coated particles with mean sizes around 6.8 and 10 nm, narrow size distribution (standard deviations of 1.4 and 1.6 nm), almost rectangular shape and magnetization values of approx. 48 and 42 emu/g were obtained at 180 and 450 W power, respectively. Particles were found to have properties such as near to zero remanence and coercivity, good crystallization and colloidal stability. The biocompatibility of the uncoated and serine coated particles was confirmed by the MTT assay on A 549 epithelial cells. Synthesized particles were found to have all the suitable properties for potential application in biomedical fields. Doxorubicin hydrochloride was loaded efficiently on both the synthesized particles, with loading efficiency obtained up to 6.8% wt/wt, for assessing their suitability as potential drug delivery agents.

The facile co-precipitation process of synthesising Superparamagnetic Iron Oxide Nanoparticles (SPIONs) especially magnetite was investigated and simplified, to develop a reproducible and scaled up synthesis process under air, for producing particles with enhanced percentage of magnetite, thus eliminating the crucial and complicated need of using the inert atmosphere. Presence of magnetite was confirmed by XRD, TEM, and Raman spectroscopy. Efficiency of synthesising magnetite was increased up to approx. ∼58 wt%, under air with no other phases but maghemite present. Alkali concentration was optimised, and particles with better magnetisation values were synthesised. The approximate weight percentage of magnetite was calculated using the simple and rapid XRD peak deconvolution method. Higher pH values from 13 to14 were investigated in the study while alkali concentration was varied from 0.5 to 4 M. 1Molar NaOH with a final pH of 13.4 was found to be optimum. Well crystallised particles with approx . 6–12 nm size, narrow size distribution and cubo-spheroidal shape were synthesised. Particles were Superparamagnetic with high values of saturation magnetisation of up to 68 emu/g and negligible values of remanence and coercivity. A reaction yield of up to 62% was obtained. Hydrophilic coated particles were produced in a single, one step facile process for biomedical applications, using optimised parameters of pH and alkali concentration obtained in the study. Single domain particles with good magnetisation formed stable aqueous dispersions. FTIR, UV-Visible and DLS were used to confirm the coating and dispersion stabilities of the particles. These particles have the requisite properties required for application in different biomedical fields.

Superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles (SPIONs) were optimally synthesized employing two energy sources viz. thermal and microwave using low temperature co-precipitation process. Both methods yielded particles with optimum physicochemical properties for biomedical applications like smaller size (~6‐–7 nm), narrow size distribution (standard deviation ~1.6–1.7 nm) and good magnetic parameters (saturation magnetisation ~53 emu/g at 9 T). Simplified process made use of domestic oven. After coating by amino acid serine, successful loading (>8 wt%) of drug Doxorubicin was achieved for both SPIONs. Microwave sample showed equivalently efficient drug loading despite half the serine coating. Findings were confirmed by various techniques like X-ray diffraction (XRD), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), Vibrating sample magnetometer (VSM) and thermo gravimetric analysis (TGA) etc. Differences in thermal homogeneities and efficiency of heat transfer between two energy modes affected the properties of synthesized SPIONs. Differences were observed in amount of serine coating, drug release behaviour and in vitro experiments on A549 cells like internalisation and cell viability data. About 59 and 39% pH and time dependent drug release at pH 5 was obtained for thermal and microwave sample respectively. In vitro experiments confirmed the successful internalisation and cell death, supporting the suitability of SPIONS as efficient targeted drug carriers. Despite lesser drug release, microwave sample showed comparable in vitro results. Study emphasizes the role and importance of energy in affecting the efficiency and functional behaviour of SPIONs as nano drug carriers. Being biocompatible and magnetic these particles can be applied successfully as efficient targeted drug delivery agents.

Magnetic Iron Oxide Nanoparticles have great scope of research and potential in biomedical fields. In their in vivo applications, the first macromolecules these nanoparticles would come in contact with, and interact in body are proteins. Physicochemical properties of the particles and protein’s nature both affect the end result of this interaction. The study summarizes the outcomes of the interaction between the protein, Bovine Serum Albumin and citric, ascorbic and glutamic acid coated hydrophilic superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles. For comparison blank particles were also studied. Changes in the conformation and secondary structure of the protein were observed. All the particles caused structural changes in protein, which were determined by the charge, size and nature of the surface groups on nanoparticles. Citric acid coated particles brought about the greatest change in protein structure while the changes by glutamic acid coated particles were of lesser degree. Different spectroscopic techniques like UV-Visible, Fluorescence and Circular Dichroism were used to investigate the changes.

Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) is increasingly becoming indispensable part of the education system. It has changed many aspects of the lives. These changes have caused educational institutions, administrators, teachers to rethink their roles, teaching and vision for the future. ICT has opened new challenges for quality education. The purpose of this review article is to discuss the benefits of Information Communication Technology use in education, in the enhancement of teaching and learning. It highlights the impacts and benefits of ICT in education, its limitations and challenges to education systems.

The constant search for new materials has provided impetus to research in piezoelectric materials. An anti-plane problem for a cracked unbounded two-dimensional poled piezoelectric plate has been investigated. The crack rims open on account of shear mechanical forces applied at the remote boundary and in-plane electric displacement field prescribed at the infinite boundary. Thus the crack yields both mechanically and electrically. Consequently, a plastic zone and a saturation zone protrude ahead of each tip of the crack. These developed zones are in turn closed by applying yield point shear stress at the rims of plastic zone and normal closing saturation limit displacement on the rims of saturation zones. Two cases are investigated when (i) the developed saturation zone length exceeds that of the developed plastic zone, and (ii) saturation zone length is smaller than that of the plastic zone. Fourier integral transform method is used in each case to obtain the length of plastic zone and saturation zone. Closed form analytic expressions are obtained in each case. Crack opening displacement and potential drop across the rims of the crack are also obtained. The effect of mechanical loads on crack closure in the presence of electric field is investigated and vice-versa. Also energy release rate expressions are obtained for both the cases.

A model for crack arrest is proposed for a poled piezoelectric plate weakened by a finite, hairline and straight crack. Remotely applied uniform, constant tension and electric field acting in the direction perpendicular to the rims of the crack opens the crack rims in mode-I type deformations. The plate is assumed to be mechanically brittle and electrically ductile. Under this assumption the plate will encounter mechanical singularity first. In this situation a plastic zone protrudes ahead of each tip of the crack. To arrest the crack from further opening, the rims of the developed plastic zones are subjected to normal cohesive quadratically varying yield point stress. Two cases investigated are: (i) when crack lie perpendicular to poling axis and (ii) crack lie parallel to poling axis. Each case is solved employing complex variable technique. Closed form analytic expressions are obtained for complex potentials, determining elastic and electric fields in the plate. A non-linear transcendental equation is obtained to determine plastic zone length, using Dugdale hypothesis.

Mobile Telecommunication applications have seen, in the last years, a remarkable increase in the number of installations and consequently there has been a relevant growth of energy consumptions. This is due to an ever-growing interest about new and reliable services in mobility calls with an increase of the BTS operational hours and traffic management, in order to guarantee the quality of the service anywhere and anytime .The most important factor for mobile communication is the optimized use of BTS. Presently 4-5 lacks of BTS are working which radiate 0-20W continuously. Most of the BTS power is wasting when there is no requirement. In the following research paper a study is made to optimize utilization of BTS. Alternatives to the existing network architecture, offer the potential to reduce energy and power consumption. It is very important to outline the strategy to conserve overall power utilized by wireless BTSs of mobile phones in lean traffic hours of the day. When some cells are switched off, we assume that radio coverage and service provisioning can be taken care of by the cells that remain active, possibly with some small increase in the emitted power, so as to guarantee that service is available over the whole area. For utilizing the BTS spectrum, a system should be made which automatically sense the coming traffic and provide power according to it. The main purpose of this paper is to utilize the GSM spectrum in an efficient way so that power consumption can be easily reduced to a level.

Machine Type Communication (MTC) introduced from the release 10 of 3rd generation partnership project (3GPP). MTC is about enabling the machines to share their data and signalling information. The paper deals with modelling of complex scenario of machine to machine communication. The model is based on the assumption that different devices will use different protocols. The proposed model uses Zigbee, ILPv6, smart authentication and RFIDs for establishing a heterogeneous complex network for machine to machine communication. The proposed model introduced intelligence at device level by the use of sensors and describes the requirement of the future communication network and solution to resolve it.

Some of the recent work done in anti-plane problems are: Chen et al. [1] investigated the crack problems for nonhomogenous materials under anti-plane shear loading using a displacement-based formulation. Wang [2] studied the behavior of a mode III crack in functionally graded piezoelectric materials investigating materials that are weakened by a single crack or a series of collinear cracks. Under the permeable crack assumption Li and Tang [3] analyzed electro-elastic: problems of an interface anti-plane shear crack in a layered piezoelectric plate. Bhargava and Saxena [4] solved the anti-plane problem of crack arrest for a piezoelectric ceramic weakened by a crack when developed plastic zones are subjected to variable stress.