Chhatrapur beach placer deposit, situated in a part of the eastern coast of Orissa, is a newly discovered high natural background radiation area (HBRA) in India. The sand samples containing heavy minerals, were collected from Chhatrapur region by the grab sampling method at an interval of ~ 1 Km. Radon exhalation rates were measured by "Sealed Can Technique" using LR-115 type type II in the san...

Wind-blown sand, or "saltation," is an important geological process, and the primary source of atmospheric mineral dust aerosols. Significant discrepancies exist between classical saltation theory and measurements. We show here that these discrepancies can be resolved by the inclusion of sand electrification in a physically based saltation model. Indeed, we find that electric forces enhance the...

Of utmost concern in storm water treatment today is the removal of dissolved phosphorus. One method to effectively determine the phosphorus removal capacity of different sand filtration media is controlled, well mixed experiments called batch studies. Batch studies with an initial phosphorus concentration typical of storm water were conducted at the University of Minnesota on C 33 sand, calcare...

Saturated sand-packed column experiments were conducted to investigate the influence of physicochemical factors on the transport and retention of surfactant stabilized silver nanoparticles (AgNPs). The normalized concentration in breakthrough curves (BTCs) of AgNPs increased with a decrease in solution ionic strength (IS), and an increase in water velocity, sand grain size, and input concentrat...

Emerging contaminant ciprofloxacin (CIP) has been frequently detected in soils. Its interactions with metals in soils remain largely unknown. We examined the effects of metal cations Cu and Ca and surface Fe/Al coating on CIP sorption by preloading Cu and Ca onto sand surface or mixing them with CIP in solution. Batch experiments with sand before and after removing Fe/Al coating on surface (coa...

The effects of oestrogenic exposure upon exposure indicators and reproductive success in a marine fish were investigated using a series of short and long-term exposures of the sand goby (Pomatoschistus minutus) to oestrogenic materials. A 140 bp cDNA probe for sand goby vitellogenin (VTG) was used to measure hepatic VTG mRNA expression. Effects on other novel and “classical” biomarkers of oestr...

Saturated sand-packed column experiments were conducted to investigate the influence of physicochemical factors on the transport and retention of surfactant stabilized silver nanoparticles (AgNPs). The normalized concentration in breakthrough curves (BTCs) of AgNPs increased with a decrease in solution ionic strength (IS), and an increase in water velocity, sand grain size, and input concentrat...

We test the common assumption that organic carbon (OC) storage occurs on sand-sized soil particles only after the OC storage capacity on silt- and clay-sized particles is saturated. Soil samples from a Brookston clay loam in Southwestern Ontario were analysed for the OC concentrations in bulk soil, and on the clay (<2 μm), silt (2-53 μm) and sand (53-2000 μm) particle size fractions. The OC con...