Due to the rapid development of multimedia and communications technologies, issues related to data vulnerability and copyrights violation has increased. Digital content can be manipulated and reproduced effortlessly. Consequently, there is a considerable requirement for techniques aimed at content protection and authentication. Watermarking techniques can provide copyrights enforcement and authentication to prevent the illegitimate use of digital content. These techniques can be classified into two categories i.e. robust watermarking and reversible watermarking. In this thesis, research work is carried out in three phases. The first phase proposes a robust watermarking technique, which is resilient against the geometrical attacks. It is helpful in executing copyright protection. In robust watermarking, watermark is able to survive in case of attack on the digital content and can be successfully retrieved on extraction. The proposed technique exploits both the robust image feature points and local Zernike moments for embedding secret information. Delaunay tessellation is employed to divide an image into distinct triangular segments based on robust features identified using Harris detector. Zernike moments are calculated for each selected triangular segment, and then the watermark is embedded in the magnitude of Zernike moments using dither modulation. In the second phase, a reversible watermarking technique is proposed. Reversible watermarking is a special type of watermarking technique in which watermark is extracted along with restoration of the host media. Whereas, in case of robust watermarking, we are not able to retrieve the original image. Such watermarking system finds its application in medical and law enforcement, etc. The proposed watermarking scheme is based on pixel value ordering. Image is divided into sub blocks and each block is assessed using a threshold value. If the block belongs to the smooth category, watermark bit is embedded. In contrast, if it is classified as rough block, then the sub block is left unchanged. This technique does not require a location map since it uses histogram shifting. In third phase, the watermarking approaches and their applications for the protection DNA sequences are explored. In DNA watermarking, which is type of text xii watermarking; watermark information should be embedded in DNA sequence in such a way that it should not raise any functional disorders in the living organism. A watermark is embedded in a DNA sequence through synonymous substitution of nucleotides. The proposed approach ensures Amino Acid conservation, efficient utilization of the available embedding space in DNA sequences, and achieves mutation resistance by since it employs Reed-Solomon codes. The performance of these techniques has been evaluated on the standard test datasets. In some of the cases, the proposed watermarking approaches performed better than the recent existing approaches and showed comparable performance in other cases. The first technique finds its application in protecting the copyrights of the owner. The second watermarking technique can be used in applications where significant amount of data needs to be embedded e.g. information related to the patient in medical images. The third technique related to the DNA watermarking can be used for protection of DNA sequences and also to provide biological data storage as large amount of data can be stored.
واجدہ تبسم:ایک بے باک افسانہ نگار محمدشاہدحفیظ۔میلسی واجدہ تبسّم۱۶مارچ۱۹۳۵ء کوامراوتی (مہاراشٹر)میں پیداہوئیں۔والدہ کاتعلق نواب خاندان سے تھا جواپنے جہیز میں ڈھیروںسونے کے علاوہ پانچ گاؤں بھی جہیز میں لائی تھیں۔جب کہ والدپیشے کے لحاظ سے وکیل تھے ،لاکھوں روپیہ کمایااورگنوایا ، یہی وجہ ہے کہ واجدہ جب ایک سال کی تھیں توان کی والدہ کی وفات اورتین سال کی عمر میں باپ کی وفات کے بعداوران کے آٹھ بہن بھائیوں کی کفالت کا ذمہ ان کی نانی نے اپنے سرلیا۔وہ سی پی کے ایک خاندان سے تعلق رکھتی تھیں۔ تقسیم کے بعدسی پی کے کئی خاندان حیدرآباددکن میں آکرآباد ہوگئے تھے۔ واجدہ کاخاندان بھی اسی میںشامل ہے جو صاحب ِ علم بھی تھااوردولت مندبھی،مگرحیدرآبادآنے کے بعد اس خاندان کی مالی حالت بہت خراب ہوگئی پھربھی ہمت اور استقلال سے اس خاندان کے لوگوں نے اپنی تعلیم کوجاری رکھا۔واجدہ تبسم نے اپنی ابتدائی تعلیم امراؤتی ہی میں حاصل کی۔ (۱) ۱۹۴۷ء میں حیدرآباددکن آئیں تویہاں حصولِ تعلیم کااِرادہ کیاتاہم گھریلو حالات کی تنگی کے باعث کلاس اوربس کی فیس ادا نہ کرنے کی وجہ سے انہیں پہلے کلاس اورپھر اسکول سے نکال دیاگیا۔واجدہ تبسّم نے نامساعدحالات میں واجدہ تبسّم نے گھر پر تعلیم جاری رکھنے کافیصلہ کیا۔ میٹرک ،ایف اے ،بی اے پرائیویٹ کیااورجامعہ عثمانیہ سے ایم اے کی ڈگری (پرائیویٹ ) حاصل کی ۔(۲) والدنے واجدہ کانام ’’واجدہ بیگم‘‘رکھامگرانھوں نے اپناقلمی نام‘‘واجدہ تبسم’’اختیار۔یہ قلمی نام انھوں نے کیوں رکھااس بارے میں وہ خود لکھتی ہیں: ‘‘صاف سیدھی بات ہے زندگی نے مجھے غم ہی غم دیے،میں اپنی زندگی میں مسکراہٹیں بھرلیناچاہتی تھی،اوریہی کیابھی،اس طرح خودمیرے خاندان میں بھی پہلے پہل بہت کم لوگوں کوپتاچلاکہ میرا ہی نام‘‘واجدہ تبسم’’ہے۔"(۳) واجدہ تبسّم نے لکھنے لکھانے کواپنامشغلہ بنایااورافسانہ نگاری میں اپنانام پیداکیا۔ان کے کئی افسانوی مجموعے شائع ہو چکے ہیں۔پہلی کہانی جریدہ "آئینہ"میں ستمبر۱۹۵۵ء میں‘‘میری یادداشت سے’’کے عنوان سے شائع...
It is generally agreed that every legal system claims authority, however, the notion of authority is one of the most controversial concepts found in western legal philosophy. There are various distinct problems involved in the notion of authority and the problem of its paradoxes. The first section of the present paper introduces the viewpoints of various western schools of thought and the philosophical analysis of the concept of legitimate authority. The conflict about the concept of legitimate authority reflects their code of life and concept of religions. The second section of the paper presents a study of the origins of the Islamic law as well as the contemporary western legal thoughts in connection with authority. In Islamic law authority-which is at once religious and moral is the will of the Creator which is basic source of Islamic law, however, jurists differentiate between legal and moral values. It concludes with the comparison between Islamic and western notion of authority.
Agave sisalana, a hard succulent CAM (crassulacean acid metabolism) plant along with other land plants like cactus, pineapple and vanilla orchids, has evolved over millions of years to drive a different kind of photosynthesis that allows the plants to survive in semiarid environments where water isn‟t always readily available. This process is known as CAM and it is the main area of interest for the scientists all over the world to develop drought resistant plants. Modern genomic approaches like gene identification, their characterization and expression under various abiotic stresses lead to the crafting of genetically resistant crops. The genomes of a number of different CAM plants have been sequenced in the past two years but Agave sisalana L. has received limited attention by many researchers around the globe as far its ability to survive under drought conditions is concerned. Therefore present study was aimed to develop drought stressed cDNA library and to find out potentially up-regulated genes expressed under drought in leaf epidermal tissue of Agave sisalana. Agave sisalana plant selection under drought stressed conditions was done on the basis of their physio-biochemical and water related attributes. All the physiological parameters including photosynthetic and transpiration rate, stomatal conductance and water use efficiency showed decreasing trend with increasing drought stressed conditions. Biochemical analyses of control and drought stressed Agave sisalana plants also played an important role in the adaptation of plants to adverse environment conditions. Plant under drought stress produces certain osmolytes like proline and products of reactive oxygen species which triggers the regulatory signaling pathways involved in the plant defense mechanism. In the present study the correlation coefficients (r) among various physiological, biochemical and water related factors under drought stress conditions also indicated that decreasing photosynthesis, transpiration, total chlorophyll content and other parameters are well monitored by the accumulation of osmolytes produced in response to abiotic traumas. In case of water related measuring parameters, the values of relative water content decreases with the drought stress compared to control where it remain significantly high. Microscopic examination of epidermal tissues of leaves of Agave sisalana showed partially and fully closed stomata upon the induction of drought stress. Stomatal conductance also decreased and showed accordance with the closed stomata under drought stress. Instantaneous water use efficiency showed contradictory results of showing decreasing trend with abiotic stress. It has been reported in many cases that it varies with different plant species as has been explained in the discussion part of the dissertation. All the biochemical assays performed in Agave plants confirmed the accumulation of macro molecules that could lead to support the idea of searching drought tolerant functional EST in leaves of Agave sisalana L. A cDNA library from drought stressed epidermal tissue of leaves of Agave sisalana L. has been constructed. Ten thousands clones were randomly picked, replicated and PCR amplified. The inserts size was found in a range of 100-1000bp. One hundred and five (105) clones (submitted to NCBI GenBank (JZ892707 - JZ892811) were sequenced and annotated. As there were no reported sequences on Agave sisalana L. under drought stress so the homology search was done in comparison with already reported sequences in land plants. Blast ( EST, nucleotide and protein) database in NCBI GenBank was used for homology search. Approximately 4% clone sequences didn‟t show homology at selection criteria (e < 1.0) whereas maximum homology was found in Elaeis guineensis (African palm 16%) followed by Phoenix dactylifera (date palm 8%), Musa acuminate (Banana 5%), Solanum species (5%), Medicago tranculata (5%), Populus trichochorpa (desert poplar 4%), Vitis vinifera (Grapes 4%), Nicotiana species (3%) and Agave species (3%) respectively. The clones (amplified PCR products) were printed in duplicate at an expected ratio of 9,408 spots per microarray chip. The labeled cDNAs were prepared from total RNAs of control and drought stressed leaves of Agave sisalana L. These labeled cDNAs were hybridized to cDNA chips, scanned and data were analyzed. Ten (10) clones were found to be differentially expressed on cDNA microarray platform. The microarray results were validated by real time PCR. EST sequences of potential candidates for drought stressed genes were analyzed through BLAST2GO programe. Out of ten (10) ESTs, maximum homology was found in Phoenix dactylifera plant. Six EST‟s which gives the best homology with drought tolerant genes in other land plants on nucleotide BLAST (nr) and protein BLAST (p) were further evaluated with real time PCR along with bioinformatics studies. Real time data analysis showed highest expression in EST‟s (JZ892752 and JZ892726) whereas EST (JZ892743, JZ892761 and JZ892787) showed low expression of drought tolerance in Agave sisalana L. The differentially expressed EST JZ892778 showed no expression or upregulated activity in stressed leaves of Agave sisalana L. Similar expression of two up-regulated ESTs (JZ892726 and JZ892752) was observed in expression behavior and fold change when compared with K means in cluster analysis of microarray. This new EST collection for the first time in Agave sisalana L. indicated an important step towards the identification of many molecular markers that aided the selective hybridization and biotechnological approaches to further improve Agave sisalana L. as drought resistant plant. Furthermore, the public availability of the novel up regulated cDNA clone sequences generated in this study will enable testing of the biological function of the genes represented and the development of transgenic plants in future.