How and What

Jatropha Jatropha is a semi evergreen shrub which can be grown in almost all regions. It produces seeds which can be processed to extract biodiesel which may be directly used in any diesel engine car or can be further processed to produce jet fuel. This plant is native to America and is generally found in Mexico and Central America. Its cultivation is very easy as it can be grown in deserts too. It doesn’t need much care to be cultivated as it is toxic in nature and is pest and weed resistant. Due to these properties, jatropha has a high potential to be used as a major source of biodiesel in future. Jatropha seeds contain 27% to 40% oil (average 34.4 %) and can be easily extracted by crushing the seeds. The residue left after extraction is not thrown as waste because it is also useful in number of ways. It can be used to feed animals and fishes after proper intoxication, it can also be used to produce biogas, high quality organic fertilizer, high quality organic pesticide....

Equinox Equinox is an event which occurs twice a year when the day and night are equal at all the places on earth. It occurs at around 20 th of March and 22 nd of September. At this time the sun is exactly above the celestial equator. At the time of equinox, all places receive sunlight and experience dark for exactly equal time. The earth is tilted at an angle of 23.5 0 about its axis. We think that the sun rises exactly in the east and sets in the west but it is not true except that for equinox. From 21 st march to 21 st September, the sun is in the higher excursion relative to the celestial equator, thus the direction of sun rise and sun set are sifted towards north. During this period, days are longer and nights are shorter in northern hemisphere and vice versa in southern hemisphere. Exactly opposite phenomenon happens from 23 rd September to 19 th of March when the sun is in the lower excursion. Theoretically the day and night are exactly equal on the equinox but n...

Bio plastics:  the “eco-friendly” way to save Earth In today’s world, where everything is changing at a fast pace, words like “biodegradable”, “eco-friendly” and “green” are emerging to be the new mantra for saving our dying planet from the plight of accumulating heaps of waste and non-recyclable materials. These words are becoming the new statement today and are finding place in every package that we carry from; from a compostable coffee mug to a mineral water bottle that we drink water in. plastics are the most hazardous form of waste material that, in spite of their countless uses, have become the headache of scientists and environment experts around the world. The most dangerous property of plastics is that they do not degrade easily in environment through natural and eco-friendly ways. The only way to decompose them is through large incinerators wherein plastics are burnt in a closed space in the presence of oxygen. But, the process liberates a large amount of lethal g...

Self-Cleaning Surfaces Self-cleaning materials have a great deal of attention lately, both in research and commercial applications because of their huge potential applications and benefits. The advantages range from reducing maintenance cost to protection from environmental pollution.   The ultimate consequence in developing the self cleaning fabrics is that use of things like chemicals, energy, manpower and water can really be limited The examples include paints, glasses, ceramics, plastics, metal surfaces, tiles and textiles, etc. Already, the shirts, blouses, skirts and trousers have been developed which shrug off ketchup, mustard, red wine and coffee stains. Also, the tiles , glasses and paints are also in market. To realize self-cleaning material surfaces two alternative principal ways have been applied: the development of super hydrophobic or the development of superhydrophilic surfaces. The lotus’s self cleaning effect stems from its surface being extremely hydrophob...

Biogenic Silica: An Inspiration to Nanotechnology Silica is an inorganic amorphous oxide formed by polymerization processes and makes up opal phytoliths in plants.  Opal phytoliths are one of several kinds of natural artifacts formed by nature to preserve its most beautiful creations in a green and environmental friendly way. The presence of biogenic silica during the life cycle of a plant is dependent on the uptake of monosilicic acid from groundwater, its super saturation, polymerization and subsequent deposition as amorphous, hydrated, polymerized silicic acid at sites within the inter- or intra-cellular vegetative structure of a plant, resulting in three-dimensional positive or negative forms. These phytoliths may remain on the ground surface to become incorporated into the soil horizon and subsequently be buried to form part of the stratigraphic matrix. These buried phytoliths survive well in many environments, so they can inform on past vegetation and are particula...

Electric discharge machine Electric discharge machine is a non-conventional method of machining complex shapes which are very difficult to be formed with equal accuracy with any other method. This method doesn’t need any hardened expensive tool or enormous pressure to cast a shape in steel, rather it incorporates high current electricity and a cathode of the same shape and size of the pattern to be formed to cast the required shape in the metal. Against other methods where tool used is of higher hardness and strength than the material to be cast, this machine uses cathodes of lower hardness and strength then that of the material to be machined. Generally, cathodes used are made up of either graphite or cooper or aluminum. The most important qualities required to select the material of electrode is that it must be highly conductive, must possess higher electronegativity than the material to be cast and must be soft so that it can be easily machined into different shapes. An el...

Shape memory alloy Shape memory alloy is an alloy that remembers its pre-deformed shape. This alloy gets back to its original shape when heated to a certain temperature. The two main types of memory alloy are copper-aluminum-nickel and nickel-titanium alloys. Some memory alloys are also created by mixing zinc, copper, gold and iron. Memory alloys have a special property that their crystal transformation is fully reversible when heated. This special property makes them memory wire. At the time of manufacturing the memory wire is trained in a shape. Due to training, when the wire is heated to the required temperature, the crystal structure of the wire reverses back to that at the time of training, thus gets back to its pre-deformed shape. This property of the metal makes it useful in making actuators, medical field, making masks, frames of spectacles, jewelry, dentistry, etc. because they are lighter in weight, and easily Handel able. Apart from having so many properties, ...

Cyanobacteria Cyanobacteria , also known as blue green algae are unicellular bacteria that obtain energy from photosynthesis and produces oxygen to support life on earth. They are prokaryotic organisms and have single membrane that capsules Protein, DNA and Mitochondria, except the fact that some species have folds on the external membranes which contain the photosynthesis mechanism. These folds in the external membrane are called thylacoids . Cyanobacteria have a bluish appearance which they obtain from a pigment named as phycocyanin . This blue colored pigment is used to capture light for photosynthesis. Cyanobacteria break the water molecule into oxygen, proton and electron through photosynthesis. The electron so produced is used as energy source and oxygen is released as byproduct. Many species of cyanobacteria are also able to reduce nitrogen and carbon dioxide under aerobic conditions. They are found in almost all aquatic ecosystems of the world and are also found in o...