Category Science

WHAT IS THE MATERIAL USED IN INDIAN CURRENCY?

In India currency notes are made up of pulp-containing cotton and balsam with special dyes to make the currency notes that should be resilient, durable, with quality to resist from wear and tear and not to be faked easily.

The materials used in the making of Indian currency notes have been starch paper blended with the textile fibers. While making currencies, these papers are instilled with gelatin to give strength to the currencies.

Chinese were the first to make currency notes and in ancient times Chinese currencies were made up of paper with mulberry bark and currently Japan has been using this fiber to make Japanese Yen currencies. Making of Indian currency notes is processed at Hoshangabad Security Paper Mill in Madhya Pradesh.

Banknotes also consist of a watermark and thread compromising of fluorescent, magnetic, metallic and micro print elements.

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CAN PAPER ONLY BE MADE FROM WOOD FIBRES?

Paper can be made from almost any kind of plant fibre. In some parts of the world, banana stalks and sugar-cane stems made fine, strong paper. On the whole, the longer fibres, the stronger paper. Paper money is folded, pushed into wallets and pocket, and passed from hand to hand. It needs to be very strong. A special paper is made that may contain cotton fiber (which come from cotton plants) or linen fiber (from flax plants).

Paper is made out of leaves and other plant fibers; you can find it in most art supply stores. Money is made with cotton fibers because they are stronger. The reason tress are used to make paper is that they provide the most fiber per square acre. There is not enough other fiber in the world to meet the demand for paper. Cotton was used for hundreds of years until the demand for paper was too much to keep up. Cotton rags were imported from other countries to try to keep up with demand until the 1800’s when somebody figured out how to get the fiber out of the trees by “digesting” them. The first paper we find in history was made from rice around 100 AD in China. Cigarette paper is still made with rice. All plants have cellulose fibers, leaves just don’t have as many fibers as wood.

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WHERE PAPER WAS FIRST MADE?

Paper was first made 2000 years ago in China. It was made from pulped rags and old fishing nets, drained on a sieve made of bamboo! Paper may not immediately seem to be an ideal building material, but it is light and cheap, and allows a certain amount of light to pass through it. It is ideal for use with bamboo, which is also very light. Paper has been used in China and Japan for centuries to make screens and internal sliding walls in houses. Although these are not soundproof, they are very attractive and easily replaced if damaged.

Paper making is one of the inventions by Chinese. 105 A.D. is often cited as the year in which papermaking was invented. In that year, historical records show that the invention of paper was reported to the Eastern Han Emperor Ho-di by Ts’ai Lun, an official of the Imperial Court. Recent archaeological investigations, however, place the actual invention of papermaking some 200 years earlier. Ts’ai Lun broke the bark of a mulberry tree into fibres and pounded them into a sheet. Later it was discovered that the quality of paper could be much improved with the addition of rags hemp and old fish nets to the pulp. The paper was soon widely used in China and spread to the rest of world through the Silk Road. An official history written some centuries later explained: In ancient times writing was generally on bamboo or on pieces of silk, which were then called it. But silk being expensive and bamboo heavy, these twoich materials were not convenient. Then Tsai Lun thought of using tree bark hemp, rags, and fish nets. In 105 he made a report to the emperor on the process of paper making, and received high praise for his ability. From this time paper has been in use everywhere and is called the “paper of Marquis Tsai.”

In few years, the Chinese began to use paper for writing. Around 600 A.D. woodblock printing was invented and by 740 A.D., The first printed newspaper was seen in China.

To the east, papermaking moved to Korea, where production of paper began as early as the 6th century AD. Pulp was prepared from the fibers of hemp, rattan, mulberry, bamboo, rice straw, and seaweed. According to tradition, a Korean monk named Don-cho brought papermaking to Japan by sharing his knowledge at the Imperial Palace in approximately AD 610, sixty years after Buddhism was introduced in Japan.

Along the Silk Road, we learned that paper was introduced to Xinjiang area very early according to the archaeological records. The paper found at Kaochang, Loulan, Kusha, Kotan, and Dunhuang sites dated as early as the 2nd century. The technique eventually reached Tibet around 650 A.D. and then to India after 645 A.D. By the time Hsuan Tsang from China arrived to India in 671 A.D., paper was already widely used there.

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HOW STRONG IS CARDBOARD MADE?

Cardboard is really just very thick paper. The machine that makes it is slightly different because the card is not wound onto a reel at the end, but cut up into sheets. For making strong, light boxes, corrugated cardboard is often used. This has paper pressed into a ridged shape sandwiched between two outer sheets.

We’ll discuss how strong cardboard boxes are, and why they are important for being able to carry anything.

The truth is, they seem disproportionally strong, and many are able to hold up to anything from 30 to 80 pounds, depending on both size, and quality, but if you get a double-walled cardboard box, you can minimally put about 60 pounds in there, up to 150 pounds in item weight. That’s huge!

How does this work? Cardboard is a single corrugated sheet, and a single wall one is made from kraft paper and glue, and three sheets are essentially stuck together with an adhesive of cornstarch, and then folded into the shape of a box, and from there assembled.  This might seem so simple, but it allows for a strong container.

So, how does it get the strength that it does? The secret is the construction of it, which is easier to understand when you equate it to normal construction processes.  You can imagine something being created? With pillars, beams, and the like, you’ll notice that those tend to be much smaller than the rest of the building, but they are capable of adding valuable and necessary support to a structure that would otherwise collapse.  Those small parts are what keep it together.

The corrugated parts of this are what help with strength, and the middle, in turn, acts as a type of support that allows for strength to be utilized to the outer sheets as well. Standard steel I beam, for example, is simple, but it has a design that allows for lots of support. The same is for cardboard.  The small corrugated areas are essentially tiny I-beams, and it works in the same way a bridge does, where it uses truss structure to bring more strength to both the interior and the exterior walls, so you’ll get double walled cardboard that’s much stronger than others.

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WHAT KIND OF PLANT FIBRE IS USED TO MAKE PAPER?

Nowadays most paper is made from specially grown trees. These trees are usually softwoods, grown in the cooler parts of the world where little else can thrive. Fir, pine, spruce, larch and cedar trees are all used. The trees do not have to be very tall or straight, as they do for timber. Almost all parts of the tree, except the bark, can be ground up into fibres for papermaking.

Most plant materials also contain nonfibrous elements or cells, and these also are found in pulp and paper. The nonfibrous cells are less desirable for papermaking than fibres but, mixed with fibre, are of value in filling in the sheet. It is probably true that paper of a sort can be produced from any natural plant. The requirements of paper quality and economic considerations, however, limit the sources of supply.

Pulped forest tree trunks (boles) are by far the predominant source of papermaking fibre. The bole of a tree consists essentially of fibres with a minimum of nonfibrous elements, such as pith and parenchyma cells.

Forests of the world contain a great number of species, which may be divided into two groups: coniferous trees, usually called softwoods, and deciduous trees, or hardwoods. Softwood cellulose fibres measure from about 2 to 4 millimetres (0.08 to 0.16 inch) in length, and hardwood fibres range from about 0.5 to 1.5 millimetres (0.02 to 0.06 inch). The greater length of softwood fibres contributes strength to paper; the shorter hardwood fibres fill in the sheet and give it opacity and a smooth surface.

Since cellulose fibre is a major constituent of the stems of plants, a vast number of plants represent potential sources of paper; many of these have been pulped experimentally. A rather substantial number of plant sources have been used commercially, at least on a small scale and at various times and places. Indeed, the use of cereal straws for paper predates the use of wood pulp and is widely practiced today throughout the world, although on a relatively small scale of production. Because many parts of the world are deficient in forests, the development of the paper industry in these areas appears to depend to a considerable degree upon the use of annual plants and agricultural fibres.

Nonwoody plant stems differ from wood in containing less total cellulose, less lignin, and more of other materials. This means that pulps of high cellulose content (high purity) are produced in relatively low yield, whereas pulps of high yield contain high proportions of other materials. Papers made from these pulps without admixture of other fibre tend to be dense and stiff, with low tear resistance and low opacity.

The morphology (form and structure) of the cells of annual plants also differs considerably from wood. Whereas the nonfibrous (parenchyma) cells of coniferous wood constitute a minor proportion of the wood substance, in annual plants this cell type is a major constituent. As hardwoods also often contain considerable amounts of nonfibrous cells, there is a closer resemblance between hardwood pulps and pulps from annual plants.

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WHO INVENTED THE LOCOMOTIVE?

A Locomotive is an engine that can travel under its own power, not pulled by horses, for example. But we usually think of it as running on tracks, or tramways, as they were first called. In 1804, Richard Trevithick (1771-1833), an English inventor, designed a train to pull coal wagons in a Welsh colliery. Trevithick was convinced that steam engines had a great future and later travelled to Peru and Costa Rica, where he introduced steam engines into the silver mines.

In 1802, Richard Trevithick patented a “high pressure engine” and created the first steam-powered locomotive engine on rails.  Trevithick wrote on February 21, 1804, after the trial of his High Pressure Tram-Engine, that he “carry’d ten tons of Iron, five wagons, and 70 Men…above 9 miles…in 4 hours and 5 Mints.”  Though a ponderous-sounding journey, it was the first step toward an invention that would utterly change man’s relationship to time and space. 

George Stephenson and his son, Robert, built the first practical steam locomotive.  Stephenson built his “travelling engine” in 1814, which was used to haul coal at the Killingworth mine.  In 1829, the Stephenson built the famous locomotive Rocketwhich used a multi-tube boiler, a practice that continued in successive generations of steam engines.  The Rocket won the competition at the Rain-hill Trials held to settle the question of whether it was best to move wagons along rails by fixed steam engines using a pulley system or by using locomotive steam engines. The Rocket won the £500 prize with its average speed of 13 miles per hour (without pulling a load, the Rocket attained speeds up to 29 miles per hour), beating out Braithwaite and Erickson’s Novelty and Timothy Hackworth’s Sans Pareil.  The Stephenson incorporated elements into their engines that were used in succeeding generations of steam engines.

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