Medicinal plants were playing an important role in our lives due to their remedial properties.
Lifesaving medicines were produced by these plants. For their better use in food and medicines
genomes sequencing of these medicinal plants was needed. Ajuga bracteosa is a medicinal plant
in family Lamiaceae (mint family). It is a herbal plant and used in many medicines. In this
research work chloroplast genome sequencing of Ajuga bracteosa was carried out by next
generation sequencing technique. DNeasy plant DNA extraction kit was used for the extraction of
DNA from fresh young leaves of Ajuga bracteosa. Quality and quantity of DNA was evaluated
using agarose gel electrophoresis and uDrop plate of Multiskan GO spectrophotometer. DNA was
lyophilized before shipment to Novagene, Hong Kong, a commercial NGS facility. Sequencing
was done using Illumina HiSeq 2500 instrument, using PE150 run, and approx. 4Gb data was
produced. Quality of short reads was checked using SolexaQA tool. Short reads were mapped
back to Ajuga reptans chloroplast genome downloaded from NCBI. Mapping was visualized
using Tablet tool, which attested to high coverage depth of chloroplast genome. The genome was
de novo assembled using Velvet tool, and several velvet runs were performed by changing kmer
values. Assembled contigs from these Velvet runs were imported in Geneious tool and used to
generate full length chloroplast genome. The assembled genome size was 150,373 bp, divided in
usual LSC, SSC and IRs. Overall genome structure and gene synteny matched to Ajuga reptans
chloroplast genome. Phylogenetic analysis showed divergence of Ajuga bracteosa from its
relatives in family Lamiaceae. This study showed intra specific and interspecific relationship
within family Lamiaceae. So, this work will help the researchers in proper identification and
differentiation of Ajuga bracteosa from the other plants of same family.
A comparison of the Islamic Banking products offered in the two countries of Pakistan and Malaysia has been discussed in this paper. The research paper uses document analysis to identify different products offered by five full-fledged Islamic banks in Malaysia and Pakistan. It is evident from the research that Islamic banking sector in Pakistan is not tapping its full growth potential as in case of Malaysia. It is also concluded that the trade financing and asset financing products offered by Islamic banks in Malaysia are more diverse than the products offered by its counterparts in Pakistan. The paper gives insight to the Shariah complaint board to introduce new products while learning from the experience of other countries. This research does not focus on investigating the reasons behind these differences; however, it initiates a discourse in this direction.
Wide bandgap semiconductors provide efficient absorption in UV and very low absorptions in the visible range of the electromagnetic spectrum. This limits their effectiveness in photocatalytic, photoactive and photosensitive devices. However, the optical properties of these semiconductors can be enhanced to provide increased absorptions in the visible range. The bandgap of the semiconductor can be modulated in several ways that include: doping, formation of heterostructures, quantum dots coupling, addition of metallic nanoparticles etc. In the present work, the surface plasmon resonance (SPR) energy of Au is utilized in three different semiconductor morphologies to tune the optical characteristics. Studies with three different dielectric environments such as: Au embedded planar, non-planar and Au coated wide bandgap semiconductors were performed. Specific studies of metal sandwiched planar (TiO2/Au/TiO2), heterostructure (ZnO/Au/TiO2) and Au coated ZnS nanostructures using various optical techniques that included spectroscopic ellipsometry, UV/Vis absorption and photoluminescence spectroscopy (PL) were performed in this work. The UV/Vis absorptions of TiO2/Au/TiO2 revealed the presence of two broad bands in the visible range, that were absent in TiO2 thin film, for both as-grown and annealed samples. This was attributed due to improved interband and plasmon resonance oscillations of Au in a dielectric environment. Spectroscopic ellipsometry of the Au, TiO2 and composite TiO2/Au/TiO2 films indicated that they carried the cumulative effect of UV and visible absorptions due to SPR phenomenon. The presence of interband transition was confirmed by fitting the experiment with the theoretical models, Tauc Lorentz model and Drude Lorentz model for TiO2 and Au, respectively. Dielectric functions obtained from ellipsometry were combined for the sandwiched structure using effective medium approximation (EMA) methods. The modelling showed the presence of interband transitions which provide improved absorption at Au/TiO2 interface. The values of Urbach energy which corresponds to TiO2 band tails extended into the visible region was also estimated. The increase in Urbach energy was xi a direct consequence of coupling of plasmons with the defect induced TiO2 band tail widened into the visible range. The effect of metal nanoparticles was observed in ZnO/Au/TiO2 nanoheterostructures in UV/Vis absorption and PL spectroscopy. The Au content embedded in the ZnO/Au/TiO2 composite was varied from 2-10 nm. It was observed that maximum absorptions in the structure occurred when Au content was varied to 6 nm (corresponding to the diameter of 9.8 ± 3.5 nm and density 1.4 x 1011 cm-2).Photoluminescence spectroscopy also revealed the maximum pinning of the defect states in TiO2 interface at 6 nm due to maximum participation of hot electrons injected through the SPR phenomenon. This study also highlighted the importance of dielectric layer and thickness surrounding the NPs as it affected the spread of Au NPs SPs resonant field. The third study comprised of the temperature dependent photoluminescence of ZnS nanostructures doped with two different elements, Mn and Sn. The defect centres in ZnS nanostructures provide very high luminescence. The coupling of these luminescent centres with the Au NPs altered the luminescence dynamics by introducing new charge transfer paths. In the present study, the overlapping of the Mn-induced defects with the SPR peak of Au resulted in quenching of UV peak corresponding to donor-acceptor transitions. While the Mn-induced defect overlapping the Au plasmon field was still present. Likewise, the presence of Au not only affected the defect-based transitions due to different ionic species in Sn-doped ZnS nanostructures but also activated the resonant processes in Sn, which is a semi-metal itself.