Saturday, February 09, 2013
2 Day Conference of Governors on February 11/12
08-February-2013 18:34 IST
The President of India to Preside Over Conference
The President of India, Shri Pranab Mukherjee, will preside over the two-day Conference of Governors on February 11 and 12, 2013 at Rashtrapati Bhavan. This is the 44thGovernors’ Conference and the first such Conference to be presided over by Shri Pranab Mukherjee.
Thirty Governors and Lt. Governors of the States and Union Territorieswill be attending the Conference. The Prime Minister, Union Ministers of Defence, Finance, Agriculture, Home Affairs, Human Resource Development, Urban Development, Water Resources, Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission and Minister of State (Independent Charge) in the Ministry of the Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Minister of State (Independent Charge) in the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation and Chairman of UIDAI will also participate in the two-day deliberations.
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SC/SKS
Tuesday, February 05, 2013
Spider legs are protected by hairs
Why Spiders Do Not Stick to Their Own Sticky Web Sites
Researchers at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute and University of Costa Rica asked
why spiders do not stick to their own sticky webs. Repeating old, widely quoted but poorly
documented studies with modern equipment and techniques, they discovered that spiders’ legs are
protected by a covering of branching hairs and by a non-stick chemical coating. Their results are published online in the journal, Naturwissenschaften.
They also observed that spiders carefully move their legs in ways that minimize adhesive forces as they push against their sticky silk lines hundreds to thousands of times during the construction of each orb.
The web-weaving behavior of two tropical species, Nephila clavipes and Gasteracantha
cancriformis, was recorded with a video camera equipped with close-up lenses. Another video camera coupled with a dissecting microscope helped to determine that individual droplets of sticky glue slide along the leg’s bristly hair, and to estimate the forces of adhesion to the web. By washing spider legs with hexane and water, they showed that spiders’ legs adhered more tenaciously when the non-stick coating was removed.
The Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, headquartered in Panama City, Panama, is a unit
of the Smithsonian Institution. The Institute furthers the understanding of tropical nature and its
importance to human welfare, trains students to conduct research in the tropics and promotes
conservation by increasing public awareness of the beauty and importance of tropical ecosystems.
Website: www.stri.si.edu.
Spiders carefully move their legs
The web-weaving behavior
# # #
 |
| Photo Courtesy:InfoVisual |
why spiders do not stick to their own sticky webs. Repeating old, widely quoted but poorly
documented studies with modern equipment and techniques, they discovered that spiders’ legs are
protected by a covering of branching hairs and by a non-stick chemical coating. Their results are published online in the journal, Naturwissenschaften.
They also observed that spiders carefully move their legs in ways that minimize adhesive forces as they push against their sticky silk lines hundreds to thousands of times during the construction of each orb.
The web-weaving behavior of two tropical species, Nephila clavipes and Gasteracantha
cancriformis, was recorded with a video camera equipped with close-up lenses. Another video camera coupled with a dissecting microscope helped to determine that individual droplets of sticky glue slide along the leg’s bristly hair, and to estimate the forces of adhesion to the web. By washing spider legs with hexane and water, they showed that spiders’ legs adhered more tenaciously when the non-stick coating was removed.
The Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, headquartered in Panama City, Panama, is a unit
of the Smithsonian Institution. The Institute furthers the understanding of tropical nature and its
importance to human welfare, trains students to conduct research in the tropics and promotes
conservation by increasing public awareness of the beauty and importance of tropical ecosystems.
Website: www.stri.si.edu.
Spiders carefully move their legs
The web-weaving behavior
# # #
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