TECHNOLOGY

22-year-old cracks police code, invents baton

Mumbai: A third-year engineering student from Nasik, Chetan Nandane, has created a multifunctional baton for Maharashtra police. The stick is equipped with various advanced features like five Light Emitting Diode (LED) lights with two-hour battery backup, megapixel camera, voice recorder, metal detector, stun gun, Global Positioning System (GPS) to count a few. The 4-feet-long stick records all the movements of its holder.

The 22-year-old engineering student Nandane, resident of Bhusaval, told the press that Chandarpur police have already purchased the stick and the response is impressive. “The crime graph is skyrocketing day by day and we don’t have sufficient number of police force. So, I thought to invent something that helps our understaffed police force to control crime. It took me 1.5 years to complete this baton,” Nandane told. Initially, the stick was just fitted with the lights but later introduced with other features after recommendations from former Director General of Police Praveen Dixit.

The LEDs have a reach of 20-40 metres at a 45-degree angle with a battery lasting three hours. The camera and voice recorder will ensure facts presented by the cops are backed by evidence. Each stick bears the name, address, blood group, and contact number of the constable holding it.

Generally, the police force faces the brunt of traffic violators. Last year in August a traffic head constable Vilas Shinde was seriously injured by two motorists in Khar and he later succumbed to his injuries.

“Had Shinde been armed with this baton (stun gun), the incident could have been averted as the stun gun dispenses low intensity shocks of 12 Volt that leaves the anti-social elements dazed for nine seconds,” said Nandane, who further added that this baton could be a great weapon to control riot-mob.

He further added that in-built voice recorder, five megapixel camera as well as the metal detector would be a great help for police officials to control crime. “The in-built GPS system would help tracking the location of specific policeman. The five high intensity LED lights have been fitted in the baton that would help the policeman during night patrolling,” he said.

His plan is to sell the stick across Maharashtra for which he has met and written to the officials concerned in Mantralaya but he has not got any positive reply yet. Besides, Nandane has written to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath to apprise him of the quality of his multifunctional stick. Nandane has started his company Fly Heights Electro Arc Private Limited. This company has eight innovative products including the multifunctional stick.

New compound that can break down plastic waste development

Tokyo: Scientists have developed a new compound that can effectively break down the toughest of plastic wastes under mild conditions.

Naturally occurring molecules as well as man-made pharmaceuticals and plastics are strung together by strong amide bonds.

Although amide bonds can give great strength to plastics, when it comes to their recycling at a later point, the difficulty of breaking these bonds usually prevents recovery of useful products.

Researchers from Nagoya University in Japan developed a series of organometallic ruthenium catalysts to break down even the toughest amide bonds effectively under mild conditions.

“Our previous catalysts could hydrogenate most amide bonds, but the reactions needed a long time at high temperature and high pressure. This new ruthenium catalyst can hydrogenate difficult substrates under much milder conditions,” said Takashi Miura of Nagoya University.

Catalysts are widely used in chemistry to help speed up reactions, but breaking the kinds of amide bonds in plastics, such as nylon, and other materials requires harsh conditions and large amounts of energy, researchers said.

Hydrogenation is the key step leading to the break-down of amide bonds. The catalyst features a ruthenium atom supported in an organic framework.

This ruthenium atom can adsorb hydrogen and deliver it to the amide bond to initiate the breakdown, researchers said.

The team probed the position of hydrogen on the catalyst in the reaction pathway and modified the shape of the supporting frame work.