A number of villages in India is yet to be electrified due to its location. At the same time it is also important to mention that grid connection to those areas is very expensive and time consuming. The source of lighting in those areas are conventional fuel based lighting system i.e. mainly kerosene based lantern. It has immense health hazard and environmental impact. To meet the energy demand...

There are numerous advantages to exploiting diffraction-limited instrumentation at astronomical observatories, which include smaller footprints, less mechanical and thermal instabilities and high levels of performance. To realize such instrumentation it is imperative to convert the atmospheric seeing-limited signal that is captured by the telescope into a diffraction-limited signal. This proces...

This paper reports the crystal structure of tetra-sodium diiron tris(phosphate), Na(4)Fe(2+)Fe(3+)(PO(4))(3), which has been synthesized hydro-thermally at 773 K and 0.1 GPa. The crystal structure has been refined in the space group Rc and is identical to that of γ-NASICON. The heteropolyhedral framework is based on a regular alternation, in three dimensions, of corner-sharing PO(4) tetra-hedra...

The emergence of space division multiplexing (SDM) for ultrahigh capacity networks has heralded pioneering Petabit-class optical transmission systems. In parallel to novel SDM fibers, a new class of components to enable scalable, low-loss schemes for unlocking fiber capacity is being developed. In this work, an all-fiber mode selective photonic lantern mode multiplexer designed for launching in...

Bioluminescence is a common feature in the permanent darkness of the deep-sea. In fishes, light is emitted by organs containing either photogenic cells (intrinsic photophores), which are under direct nervous control, or symbiotic luminous bacteria (symbiotic photophores), whose light is controlled by secondary means such as mechanical occlusion or physiological suppression. The intrinsic photop...

The effects of the burning of fireworks on air quality in Beijing was firstly assessed from the ambient concentrations of various air pollutants (SO2, NO2, PM2.5, PM10 and chemical components in the particles) during the lantern festival in 2006. Eighteen ions, 20 elements, and black carbon were measured in PM2.5 and PM10, and the levels of organic carbon could be well estimated from the concen...