Nanostructured materials including variety of metals and semiconducting oxides in the field of one dimensional (1-D) nanostructure have fascinated great attention from both fundamental basis and technological points of view. Zero (0-dimensional) and one dimensional (1-D) nanostructured metal oxide thin films including nanostructures, such as nanobelts, nanowires, nanotubes, nanorods, nanopyramids and nanospheres etc. have gained incredible consideration for their potential applications in optoelectronic as well as in electronic technology within the last decade. Some fundamental facts and phenomena related to 1-D nanostructures are still not cleared for example, high surface to volume ratio in semiconductors demonstrate surprising growth architecture, e.g. temperature and diameter-dependent growth directions, strange doping levels and organization, which are still not known for their macroscopic crystals or thin-film counterparts. The incorporation of metallic nanoparticles in semiconductor materials not only customize its properties but also breed a collective new event based on interaction of both at interface. The addition of external metallic ions through any means can promote charge separation effectively and also improve light absorption in the semiconductor. In this thesis, state-of-the-art approaches and strategies for shaping of one-dimensional functional semiconductors can be used for variety of applications including sensors, actuators, optoelectronics, spintronic, biomedical sciences and energy harvesting fields. Amongst semiconducting metal oxide nanomaterials, Chromium Dioxide (Cr2O3), Zinc Oxide (ZnO), and Tungsten oxide (WO) are important and most promising candidates for use as functional building blocks in wide range of applications, based on the fact that they are the best candidates for structural, chemical, optical and transport properties for use in optical and electrochemical devices. These novel materials with unique physical and chemical properties have been significantly assigned to their distinctive structural aspects in between the isolated quantum atoms and the bulk macroscopic materials. Upto now, various doping elements may n or p-type have been studied as a dopant in metal oxides to improve their conductivity and stability at high temperatures. For example, n type or p-type dopant elements exploit the properties of the host oxide and manipulate conductivity by generating surplus or deficiency in the valence electrons. In this project, we successfully report the production of fractal type one dimensional (1-D) semiconductor nanostructures including (nanosheets, nanotriangles, nanodiamond like octahedrons, nanoflakes, nanowires, nanopillars, nanocauliflowers, nanospheres and nanopyramids) of Cr2O3, ZnO and WO doped with transition metals including Nickel (Ni), Niobium (Nb), Germanium (Ge), Gold (Au), Zirconium (Zr) and Multiwalled Carbon Nanotubes (MWCNTs) as dopant elements to tailor the structural, morphological, vibrational, optical and transport properties of host oxides. We utilized Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD) technique for the growth of Ni doped Cr2O3 thin films whereas Aerosol assisted chemical vapor deposition (AACVD), a chemical solution based method is used to synthesize semiconducting metal oxide nanowires, nanospheres, nanopillars, nanocauliflowers, nanoflakes and nanopyramids in doped Zinc Oxide (ZnO) and Tungsten Oxide (WO). The morphological properties, crystalline structure, chemical composition and optical behavior are presented to understand the fundamentals involved in the growth of 1-D nano architecture. We investigate the parameters which control the nucleation, organization and evolution of these multifaceted structures providing new insights to the stepwise homogeneous mechanism and the conventional nucleation performed by the metallic ions. In recent years, one of the variant of CVD called aerosol assisted chemical vapor deposition (AACVD) provides a wide range and choice of precursors which are soluble in solvents. Also the delivery of the precursors is very simplified and easy for different chemical sources to transport e.g. species of Zn, O and any doping through single line. The architecture of AACVD grown thin films for optoelectronic devices can be tailored by the suitable choice of substrate, physical aspects of solute and solvent, type of carrier gas and growth environment i.e. substrate temperature. The most critical parameters during deposition in aerosol assisted CVD involves the maintained substrate temperature and duration which can affect the quality of nanostructures. Under consideration of these parameters, we have successfully deposited coatings and produced nanoarchitecture of doped metal oxide nanostructured thin films of Cr2O3 using PLD (at temperature of 450°C onto silicon, 1 0 0), ZnO and WO using AACVD (at temperature of 400°C onto silica) via methanol and toluene. Various metalorganic sol of precursors was considered for their viability in yielding doped zinc oxide nanohierarchical architecture by AACVD, potentially active in the market of transparent conductors. Electrical conductivities of the grown nanostructures were observed to be ineffective for use in TCO; however, nanostructured thin films produced from precursor of zinc acetate [Zn (C2H3O2)2] showed high transparency in the visible (VIS) and infrared (80-90) % region with preferential orientation along (0 0 2) or c-axis growth. All deposited nanostructured thin films presents fluctuating surface morphology, crystallite orientations which were subjected to the experimental conditions e.g. substrate temperature during deposition and choice of doping. The outcomes of this project involves the success in tailoring of densely packed fractal type nanostructures including nanosheets, nanodiamond like octahedrons for the first time reported in literature, nanowires, nanospheres, nanopyramids, nanopillars and nanocauliflowers with improved structural, morphological and functional (optical and electrical) properties for use in technological applications e.g. optoelectronics and gas sensors. Rarely developed nanopyramids and nanotriangles of ZnO and Cr2O3 in this project potentially can be used in thin film solar cells of silicon community, because firstly this pyramidal architecture can meritoriously enhance scattering of light that can probably increases the absorption of light being absorbed by the cell and secondly such type of hierarchical structures can easily be prepared by simple approaches based on solution dynamics and powder metallurgical methods rather than expensive vacuumcentered techniques. Later, nanoarchitecture of Zinc Oxide (ZnO) and Tungsten Oxide (WO) were redeposited onto sensor substrate using AACVD. All patterned undoped and doped metal oxide sensors were tested at various gases to investigate the detection of toxic trace elements that is also a future task.
1۔عوام میں مذہبی جوش و جذ بہ کی قلت پاکستان میں ابھی ایسا ماحول نظر نہیں آ رہا جو دینی احکام پر عمل درآمد کے لیے سازگار ہو۔ دینی احکام و اسلامی قوانین کا نفاذ اور ان پر عملدرآمد ایک بہت بڑی ذمہ داری ہے ۔ اس ذمہ داری کو پورا کرنے کے لیے ہمت اور جذبہ کی ضرورت ہوتی ہے۔ عوام میں وہ جذبہ اور حوصلہ ابھی ناپید ہے۔ یہ جذبہ اور حوصلہ پیدا کرنا صرف مذہبی و اخلاقی اداروں کا کام نہیں اور نہ صرف حکومتوں کا کام ہے ، بلکہ یہ ہم سب کا ہے ۔ ہم میں سے کتنے لوگ ایسے ہیں جو اپنے ذاتی مفاد ات کی وجہ سے شریعت سے پہلو تہی کرنا شروع کردیتے ہیں ؟ ایسے لوگ کتنے ہیں جو سال ختم ہونے پر رمضان شریف کا مہینہ شروع ہونے سے پہلے بینکوں سے رقم اس لیے نکلوا لیتے ہیں، تاکہ ان کا مال زکوۃ کی ادائیگی کے نتیجے میں کم نہ ہوجائے؟ ۔ کتنے لوگ ہیں جنہیں اگر کہا جائے کہ اس دوا ئی میں آپ کی بیماری کا علاج موجود ہے، لیکن اس میں شراب یا کوئی اور حرام مواد پایا جاتا ہے ، تو وہ اس سے رک جائیں؟۔ کسی بھی فلاحی اور جمہوری معاشرے میں اسلام کے عملی نفاذ کی اصل طلب اور جوش و جذ بہ عوام کی طرف سے ہونا چاہیے ۔ جب تک وہ اس بارے میں گرم جوشی اور طلب کا مظاہرہ نہیں کریں گے، اس وقت تک حدود و قصاص قوانین کے نفاذ میں صحیح پیش رفت نہیں ہو سکتی ۔
Plant are benefitted in different aspects by symbiotic bacteria. Environmental conditions, Plant conditions and type of pathogens determine these important services for plants Objective: The research was conducted to assess the plant growth enhancing effects of wheat and cabbage rhizobacteria on the growth of wheat plantMethods: For this purpose, total 49 bacteria were isolated and characterized from the rhizosphere of wheat and cabbage plants. The isolates were assessed for plant growth promoting properties such as: indole acetic acid production, phosphate solubilization, antibacterial activity and heavy metal resistance. Indole acetic acid was found to be produced by 7 isolates and phosphate solubilization was shown by 20 isolates. Antibacterial activity was determined against four clinical isolates like Staphylococcus aureus, Klebsiella sp, Escherichia coli and Pseudomonas aeruginosaResults: Antibacterial activity against Staphylococcus aureus was shown by 38 isolates, 12 isolates showed antibacterial activity against Escherichia coli and Klebsiella sp, whereas no isolate was found to bepositive against Pseudomonas aeruginosa. Another plant growth enhancing trait (heavy metal resistance) was shown by 28 rhizobacteria. In order to evaluate the capability of isolates to enhance the plant growth, bio-inoculation assay was performed using wheat seedsConclusions: Rhizobacterial inoculation increased the number of roots, shoots, leaves and roots and shoot length of wheat plantlets as compared to un-inoculated control.
Present study deals with the correlation of Toxoplasma with some endocrine parameters for the assessment of immunopathogenic mechanism in human population selected from different localities of Lahore. Besides analysis of blood using ELISA for various parameters (anti-Toxo IgG and IgM, Insulin, TSH, T3, T4, FSH, LH, testosterone and estradiol) this multidisciplinary study involved the questionnaire survey of the area for the assessment of health status of the study respondents and risk factors regarding toxoplasmosis. Data was analyzed statistically by Chi-square test, ttest, ANOVA and correlation (p<0.05). Analysis of data revealed that seroprevalence of Toxoplasma infection was significantly related to various factors; socioeconomic status, pica habits, consumption of untreated water for drinking purpose and exposure to oocysts contaminated surfaces as feral cats have high abundance in the study areas. Toxoplasma gondii infection was highly prevalent among study subjects. It was found that chronic Toxoplasma infection was more prevalent (58.5%) among respondents then acute/recent cases (41.5%). Gender wise comparison showed that prevalence of infection was higher among male subjects (86%) in compared to the females (34%). Percentage prevalence of Toxoplasma had positive correlation with seropositivity among subjects of 36-44+ years of age. Toxoplasma infection was found to be correlated with different endocrine hormones. Higher insulin concentration was detected among seropositive subjects reflecting similar trend in both sexes. The deviation was significant among senior age groups. The concentration of TSH, T3 and T4 was detected to be higher than the reference value among 9%, 19% and 79% subjects respectively. In case of male seropositive subjects, LH was significantly higher (11.89±0.66mlU/ml) whereas testosterone was found to be lower (2.82±0.13ng/ml) than normal reference value. In general female Toxoplasma positive respondents were detected with variable ranges of FSH, LH and estradiol during various reproductive phases. These changes in various hormones reflect the possible role of toxoplasmosis leading to various metabolic disorders and reproductive problems. The results are depictive of the fact that lack of education and awareness, poor hygiene conditions and other risk factors greatly enhance the transmission of such parasites. The results of the study are significant and provide enough evidence regarding toxoplasmosis and its correlation with the changes in various hormones leading to health effects.