IIT alumni’s party wants to be agent of change
By Richa Sharma, IANS,
New Delhi : They gave up plush jobs to jump into politics two years ago - something not too many Indian professionals do. The party that 20 alumni of the Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) floated has now fielded two candidates in the Nov 29 Delhi assembly polls.
After all, both techies and politicians are harbingers of change, say the founder members of Bharat Punarnirman Dal, or India Rejuvenation Force.
Found: the cells that make people fat
By IANS,
Washington : Scientists have identified an important fat precursor cell that may explain how changes in the numbers of fat cells might increase obesity.
The finding could also have implications for understanding how fat cells affect conditions like diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
"The identification of white adipocyte progenitor cells provides a means for identifying factors that regulate the proliferation and differentiation of fat cells," said co-author Jeffrey Friedman, professor at Rockefeller University and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator.
Researchers stumble on cell’s neatest little tricks
By IANS,
Washington : Researchers have solved one of our bodies' neatest little tricks - how a cell pinches molecules from outside without allowing any leakage ot its membranes.
"Doing this without leaking is quite a feat," said Sandra Schmid, who heads Scripps Research department of cell biology and co-authored the paper with Thomas Pucadyil, a postdoctoral researcher in her lab.
"A cell's outside environment is very nasty, and if any of that toxic fluid got into the cell, it would kill it," added Schmid.
Avoid diseases by exposing food to radiation: scientist
By V. Jagannathan, IANS
Chennai : The government should allow the generic use of irradiation technology - a process of exposing food to controlled radiations like gamma rays, X-rays, and accelerated electrons that kill harmful organisms - to prevent diseases and increase shelf life of food, says a top atomic scientist.
"The Prevention of Food Adulteration Act should be amended to allow irradiation of food products on a generic basis," Arun K. Sharma, head of the Food Technology Division of the Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), told IANS here.
India set to acquire precision bomb technology
By Gulshan Luthra, IANS
Paris : India's state-run Ordnance Factory Board (OFB) is negotiating the acquisition of precision bomb technology from US arms major Raytheon.
US pulls Patriot missile systems from Turkey
Ankara : The US has decided to withdraw its border protection mission in Turkey which was deployed against possible threats from Syria, a...
Simple device boosts vehicle mileage dramatically
By IANS,
Washington : Steeply rocketing fuel prices have prompted a physics professor to develop a simple device that boosted fuel efficiency by 20 percent in field tests - an electrically charged tube that can be attached to the fuel line of a car's engine near the fuel injector.
Powered by the vehicle's battery, the device creates an electric field that thins the fuel, so that smaller droplets are injected into the engine. That leads to more efficient and cleaner combustion than a standard fuel injector, said the developer, Rongjia Tao, professor of physics at Temple University.
Four solar, two lunar eclipses in 2011
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Four solar and two total moon eclipses will be observed in different parts of the world, including in India, in 2011.
Machine to deliver ultra-short flashes of X-ray light
By DPA
Hamburg : An underground machine which can deliver ultra-short flashes of X-ray light and peer into atoms is to be built in this north German city.
A cactus took 52 years to bloom
By IANS,
London : A British couple are elated after their cactus began to bloom - a good 52 years after it was planted.
John, 90, and his wife Barbara Long, 85, patiently waited all these years for the cactus to bloom. They had bought the plant in 1958.
The cactus is outside their home in Hitchin, and has reached a height of 10 feet. "I can't describe the excitement," The Sun quoted Barbara as saying.
India launches rocket carrying latest communication satellite
By IANS
Sriharikota : A rocket carrying India's latest communication satellite lifted from this launch pad in Andhra Pradesh Sunday evening after a series of delays caused by a technical glitch.
The launch of the geo-synchronous satellite launch vehicle GSLV-F04 was originally scheduled for 4.21 p.m. but was successively delayed as scientists worked furiously to get over the glitch, an official here said, without specifying what the problem was.
Brand logo can make you think differently
By IANS
New York : Whether you are a Mac person or a PC person, even a brief exposure to the Apple logo may make you behave more creatively, according to a new study.
Most people are exposed to thousands of brand images daily and it is assumed this does not affect those exposed in any way. But the new study has demonstrated that even fleeting glimpses of logos can affect people quite dramatically, ScienceDaily reported.
The study, by Duke and Waterloo University researchers, has been published in the forthcoming issue of the Journal of Consumer Research.
Robot system to test 10,000 chemicals for toxicity
By IANS,
Washington : A new high-speed robot screening system can test 10,000 different chemicals for potential toxicity.
Future computers will talk and feel
By IANS
London : A computer that can interact with humans and react to their non-verbal gestures is being developed by a European team.
Known as SEMAINE, the project will build a sensitive artificial listener (SAL) system, which will perceive user's facial expression, gaze, and voice and then engage with the user.
When engaging with a human, the SAL will be able to adapt its own performance and pursue different actions, depending on the non-verbal behaviour of the user, reports Sciencedaily.
NASA says Atlantis launch doubtful amid rough weather
By RIA Novosti
Washington : The launch of the Atlantis shuttle from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, scheduled for Thursday afternoon, could be delayed by the turbulent weather continuing to sweep the U.S. south, NASA said.
Meteorologists have given a mere 30% chance of acceptable weather conditions for the launch, set for 2:45 p.m. (7:45 p.m. GMT). Nearby Arkansas, Kentucky and Alabama have been hit by major tornadoes in the last few days that have killed at least 52 people.
Kashmir varsity produces world’s first cloned pashmina goat
By IANS,
Srinagar : Scientists at the agricultural university in the Jammu and Kashmir capital have successfully produced the world's first cloned pashmina goat, a statement said Tuesday.
NASA’s Mars rover Spirit begins new chapter
By IANS,
Washington : After six years of unprecedented exploration, NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Spirit will no longer be a fully mobile robot.
NASA has designated the once-roving scientific explorer a stationary science platform after efforts during the past several months to free it from a sand trap were unsuccessful.
The venerable robot's primary task in the next few weeks will be to position itself to combat the severe Martian winter.
Fist sized bats louder than loudest rock concerts
By IANS,
London : Fist sized bats emit much louder sounds than the noisiest rock concerts anywhere, according to a new study.
Using microphone arrays and photographic methods, researchers found that bats emit ear shattering sounds exceeding 140 deciBels (dB) at 10 cm from the source, far louder than the 115-120 dB produced by a rock concert, reports Sciencedaily.
This is the first comparative field study of bat echo-location sounds, illustrating the value of an interdisciplinary approach combining bat biology, ecology, behavioural biology and acoustics.
Recession’s long reach – Moon and Mars missions of US
By Prashant K. Nanda, IANS,
New Delhi : The global financial crisis will severely affect the US manned mission to the Moon and then to the red plant Mars, says Jerry Linenger, a renowned astronaut of American space agency NASA, while lauding India's growing role in space.
"It will affect the space programmes. The economic recession will certainly affect the missions to Mars and the Moon," Jerry Linenger told IANS. Linenger was here to attend the Hindustan Times Leadership Summit.
Indian students on solar eclipse ‘odyssey’ to China
By IANS,
New Delhi : A group of 10 students from various schools of the country are among the lucky few chosen to watch the 21st century's longest solar eclipse from Anqing in China, one of the best places in the world to view the spectacle July 22, apart from a village in Bihar.
The students will leave for China Saturday on an eight-day scientific expedition called 'heliodyssey' to watch the eclipse that will last for six minutes and 44 seconds, making it the longest eclipse till 2132.
Sign language over cell phones now possible in US
By IANS,
Washington : A Washington University team has developed a software that enables deaf or hard-of-hearing Americans to use sign language over a mobile phone video link.
The real-time video communication between cell phones, demonstrated for the first time in the country, has evoked tremendous response from the aurally challenged since its posting on YouTube.
"A lot of people are excited about this," said principal investigator Eve Riskin, a professor of electrical engineering at the Washington University (WU).
Mobility and green technology will rule the next decade
By Prasanto K. Roy, IANS,
Technology in the second decade of this millennium will build on the foundation laid in the first 10 years for mobility, cloud computing and green technology that saw the birth of the iconic iPhone, third generation telephony, notebooks, netbooks and the iPod with a camera.
Here's a peek into what's in store:
Hybrid cars will spare petrol but guzzle water
By IANS
Washington : With crude oil at $110 a barrel, hybrid and electric cars may well seem the need of the hour. But they too will come at a cost - they will severely strain scarce water resources, warns a new study.
Each mile driven with electricity consumes about three times more water than each mile driven with petrol, the study found, reports Sciencedaily.
Carey W. King and Michael E. Webber calculated water usage, consumption and withdrawal during petroleum refining and power generation in the US.
Robotic hands designed by Indian American move ultra-tiny particles
By IANS,
Washington : Microscopic, chemically triggered robotic "hands" developed by biomolecular engineers, led by an Indian American, can move ultra-tiny components.
These chemically triggered microscopic devices or 'hands', that manipulate particles smaller than a grain of sand, can be used in lab-on-a-chip applications and micro-manufacturing, the researchers say.
Indians must search for truth behind myths: scientist
By Madhushree Chatterjee, IANS
New Delhi : A cat has nine lives. Or may be not. A cat can survive death plunges from 32-storey buildings because of variations in speed, heartbeats and energy loss that act as cushions while falling, explains visiting Australian scientist Karl Kruszelnicki.
Two NASA instruments to be on India’s moon mission
By IANS
Chennai : When India's first unmanned lunar spacecraft Chandrayaan-I takes off in April from the shores of Sriharikota, in Andhra Pradesh, it will carry a payload that includes two critical NASA instruments to map the moon.
The NASA payloads will be a miniature synthetic aperture radar to map ice deposits in the moon's surface and a moon mineralogy mapper to assess its mineral resources.
IBSA to take scientific research cooperation to next
By IANS,
Mamallapuram: Taking the trilateral developmental initiative between India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) to the next step, programme coordinators are mulling ways to expand the programme's reach.
Fresh estimates of Earth’s liquid assets revealed
Washington : Using NASA's fleet of Earth-observing satellites, scientists have provided estimates for the global water cycle budget for the first decade of the...
Scientists watch evolution unfold in a bottle
By IANS,
Washington : Scientists now have physical proof of how species evolve and the fittest survive, after a 21-year study in which they documented the evolution of single-celled E. coli bacteria over 40,000 generations.
Richard Lenski, Hannah professor of microbial ecology at Michigan State University (MSU), said: "It's extra nice now to be able to show precisely how selection has changed the genomes of these bacteria, step by step over tens of thousands of generations."
India: Deccan plateau may hold answer to reduce carbon emissions
By NNN-PTI
Visakhapatnam (India) : The vast tracts of India's Deccan volcanic plateau may hold the answer to reduce carbon emissions responsible for global warming that has posed a threat to the earth.
Indian geologists have discovered that the sprawling basalt rocks in the Deccan plateau had turned carbon dioxide trapped in them during their formation into carbonates or varieties of salts over the years.
Google upgrades search technology
By DPA,
San Francisco : Google unveiled new features for its signature search tools Monday, including an ability to search by sight, a mobile translator and a real-time search of more than 1 billion new social media pages created every day.
Google executives showed off the upgrades at an annual company event called Searchology.
‘Even microbes at risk from climate change’
By IANS,
Washington : Not just humans, climate change will also impact the microscopic world of bacteria, fungi and other microbial populations that support life on Earth.
“Microbes perform a number of critical functions for ecosystems ... we are only starting to understand the impact that global climate change is having on them,” said Kathleen Treseder of the University of California.
Treseder studied the effect of rising temperatures and fungi on carbon stores in Alaskan boreal forests, one area of the globe that is experiencing greater warming than others.
Computer virus targets Russian opposition
By IANS,
Washington : Opponents of Russian president-elect Vladimir Putin are being targeted through a computer virus sent by email, CNN reported.
Scientists create billions of particles of anti-matter
By IANS,
Washington : When you shoot laser through a gold bit the size of a pinhead, suddenly more than 100 billion particles of anti-matter materialise.
The anti-matter, also known as positrons, shoots out of the target in a cone-shaped plasma "jet."
This new ability to create a large number of positrons in a small lab opens the door to several fresh avenues of anti-matter research, including an understanding of the physics underlying phenomena such as black holes and gamma ray bursts.
When WhatsApp, BBM foxed poll officials
By Mohit Dubey
Lucknow: How does one prevent hate speeches and inflammatory videos from being shared through applications like WhatsApp and on BlackBerry Messenger (BBM)?...
Space Shuttle Atlantis launch set for Feb 7
By DPA
Washington : The launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis has been pushed to Feb 7 in Cape Canaveral, Florida, NASA has said.
The shuttle that is to carry the European Columbus laboratory to the International Space Station was originally set to takeoff Dec 6, but has been delayed numerous times because of technical problems with onboard fuel sensors.
The seven-member crew is to conduct several space walks to install the Columbus laboratory.
Manmohan advocates nuclear technology for world growth
By Arun Kumar, IANS,
Washington: Advocating greater use of nuclear technology to meet today's developmental challenges, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Tuesday announced India's ambitious plans to increase India's installed capacity for nuclear energy more than seven fold by 2022.
"Our target is to increase our installed capacity more than seven fold to 35,000 MWe by the year 2022, and to 60,000 MWe by 2032," he told world leaders from 47 nations gathered here for the global Nuclear Security Summit hosted by President Barack Obama.
Europe’s biggest wind energy park inaugurated in Portugal
By DPA,
Lisbon : Portugal's Economy Minister Manuel Pinho Wednesday inaugurated what was described as Europe's biggest wind energy park in the northern region of Viana do Castelo.
The Alto Minho I park began generating energy already a year ago, gradually increasing its production to the full potential Wednesday.
The 120 turbines divided between five sub-stations will produce 530 gigawatts annually or one percent of Portugal's energy.
The park, which cost 400 million euros ($520 million), was expected to reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 370,000 tonnes annually.
Iran launches satellite
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Iran has successfully launched an observation satellite, Iranian news network Press TV reported Friday.
Microsoft buys into $15 billion Facebook
By DPA
San Francisco : Microsoft beat off a rival bid from Google to invest $240 million in hit social networking site Facebook, in a deal that values the start-up at $15 billion.
Microsoft's $240 million payment gives it just a 1.6 percent stake in the Silicon Valley start-up founded three years ago by Mark Zuckerberg, 23.
He dropped out of Harvard to develop the company and his 20 percent stake now makes him worth a cool $3 billion.
The powerful are not compassionate, shows study
By IANS,
Washington : Can a powerful person be compassionate? The answer is no. They even have a weak desire to know or be friends with a distressed individual, according to a new study.
Gerben A. van Kleef of the University of Amsterdam and his colleagues from the University of California, Berkeley, examined how power influences emotional reactions to the suffering of others.
They suggested that powerful people's tendency to show less compassion and distress towards others reinforces their social power.
He’s built an aircraft, now wants full-time job!
By Sanu George
Thiruvananthapuram : Saji Thomas is 45 years old from Kerala and, while God did not give him the faculties of...
Chandigarh to digitise documents of Le Corbusier
By IANS,
Chandigarh : Some invaluable documents related to legendary French architect Le Corbusier who planned Chandigarh in the 1950s can be seen online very soon, thanks to a move to digitise them.
The administration of the union territory of Chandigarh has decided to digitise all the old documents of Corbusier about the designing of the city and all the correspondence between the Indian government and other architects of that time.
Chandigarh is one of India's most well-planned cities.
U.S. shuttle Endeavour safely lands after 16-day space trip
By Xinhua
Washington : The U.S. space shuttle Endeavour returned home on Wednesday night at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, ending its record-long 16-day construction mission for the International Space Station, NASA TV broadcasted.
After a journey of 6.5 million miles (10.5 million km), Endeavour with seven astronauts aboard touched down at 8:39 p.m. EDT Wednesday (0039 GMT Thursday), just one hour after local sunset. The shuttle continued to come to a full stop on the runway shortly.
Kerala software park land acquisition complete
By IANS,
Thiruvananthapuram : The Kerala government Monday said all formalities for acquisition of the remaining 245.89 acres for the development of Technocity, the next phase of Technopark software park near here, has been completed.
With this, Technopark's total area will spread across 451 acres, which includes not just space for IT-ITES firms but also residential, commercial, hospitality, medical and educational facilities to make it a complete IT city.
The project is planned as a satellite city that would not strain the resources and infrastructure of the state capital.
Computer glitch blamed for Russian nuclear sub accident
By RIA Novosti,
Moscow : The accident on the Russian nuclear submarine Nov 8 that killed 20 people could have been caused by a computer glitch, a Russian daily reported Wednesday.
The accident occurred when nuclear submarine Nerpa was undergoing sea trials in the Sea of Japan. Three submariners and 17 shipyard workers died in the accident. There were 208 people, 81 of them submariners, on board the vessel at the time.
Space exploration gains pace in China
By Andrei Kislyakov, RIA Novosti,
Moscow : China is going to play a major role in the global space exploration programme. Soon, a new centre for space research may emerge in the eastern hemisphere and push the current players aside.
China's achievements in science and technology, as well as its consolidation of space programmes in the countries of the Asia-Pacific region, which have a tremendous economic potential, will contribute to its development.
Discovery undocks from expanded space station
By DPA,
Washington : The space shuttle Discovery has undocked from the International Space Station (ISS) to head back to Earth after a week on a milestone construction mission that has doubled the capacity of the orbiting laboratory.
The mission astronauts installed a fourth set of solar panels, completing the power plant needed to double the station's electrical generating capacity. The power allows the station to sustain six long-term residents instead of the current crew of three, and more occupants could arrive as early as May.
Human brain learns best at night
Sydney, Sep 13 (IANS) The human brain learns more effectively at night than in the morning, a young scientist in Australia has found out.
Martin Sale, an Adelaide University Ph.D student, used magnetic brain stimulation to investigate how the brain learns.
He found that the cerebral cortex, the area of the brain that controls movement, learns best at night.
The findings could have implications for people who are recovering from brain injuries.
Breakup of the $78.5 mn Chandrayaan bill
By IANS,
Chennai : Break-up of the Rs.3.86 billion ($78.5 million) bill for India's maiden moon mission:
Deep Space Network: Rs.1 billion ($20 million)
Rocket: Rs.1 billion ($20 million)
Payload development: Rs.530 million ($11 million)
Spacecraft bus: Rs.830 million ($17 million)
Scientific data centre, external network support and project management expenses: Rs.500 million ($10 million)
Melting sea ice spurs warming in Arctic
By IANS,
Sydney : Melting sea ice is a major cause of warming in the Arctic, says a new study.
The findings by the University of Melbourne (UM) team reveal that the rapid melting of sea ice has dramatically increased the levels of warming in the region in the last two decades.
Lead author James Screen of the School of Earth Sciences (UM) says the increased Arctic warming was due to a positive feedback between sea ice melting and atmospheric warming.
Microsoft to give upgraded Windows for free?
California: As Microsoft plans to wind up Windows 8.1 operating system next month, the firm plans to announce a free version of Windows in...
Endeavour heads for space station with new picture window
By DPA,
Washington : The space shuttle Endeavour lit up the Florida coast before dawn Monday as it blasted off for a mission to the International Space Station (ISS).
The 1014 GMT start was the final night-time launch for the ageing shuttle fleet, which is to be mothballed later this year.
Endeavour is carrying a six-window viewing area that will give astronauts a panoramic look at Earth, the station and visiting spacecraft.
Endeavour's 13-day mission will carry the Tranquility node to the ISS, making the orbiting space lab 90-percent complete.
Scientists discover 10 new planets outside solar system
By Xinhua
Washington : An international team of astronomers has found 10 new extra-solar planets, planets that orbit stars other than our sun, University of California, Santa Barbara, announced on Tuesday.
The new international collaboration is called "SuperWASP," for Wide Area Search for Planets. In the last six months the SuperWASP team has used two batteries of cameras, one in Spain's Canary Islands and one in South Africa, to discover the 10 new extra solar planets.
India’s top space scientist heads world astronautics body
By IANS,
Bangalore : India's top space scientist G. Madhavan Nair has been elected president of the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) at its general assembly in South Korea, the Indian space agency said Monday.
Nair, chairman of the state-run Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), has been vice-president of the IAA for four years prior to taking over the prestigious post Sunday at Daejeon in South Korea.
Moon mission, a great event for India: Abdul Kalam
By IANS,
Hyderabad : Former president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam Tuesday said the launch of India's maiden unmanned moon mission Chandrayaan-1 was a great event for the country.
"What I am looking for is a great event. It is a very important day. India lacks payload and it is going to land its payload on the moon," he said during a brief chat with reporters on the sidelines of the first world congress on disaster management here.
"It will take eight to 10 days (for landing of payload on moon)," he added.
Telescope-like device may reverse vision loss
By IANS
Washington : A small telescope-like device developed by ophthalmologists in the US may be able to halt and even reverse vision loss caused by macular degeneration, an age-related eye disease.
According to a new study published in the Archives of Ophthalmology, the optical prosthetics, tiny enough to be balanced on a fingertip, dramatically improved the vision of about two thirds of 206 patients studied in a 24-month clinical trial.
Scientific texts in 3D with interactive formats developed
By IANS,
Washington : Biologists and biochemists can access 3D images of biomacromolecules underlying biological functions and disease, thanks to a collaborative website called Proteopedia.
The web resource displays protein structures and other biomacromolecules in interactive format. These interactive images are surrounded by descriptive text containing hyperlinks that change the appearance (such as view, representations, colors or labels) of the adjacent 3D structure to reflect the concept explained in the text.
Google distorts reality, Austrian study says
By DPA
Vienna : Google, the world's largest Internet search engine, is on several fronts a danger that has to be stopped, a study released by Austria's Graz University claims.
A research team led by Prof. Hermann Maurer, chairman of Graz University's Institute for Information Systems and Computer Media, argues that Google is turning into a new version of George Orwell's "Big Brother" - creating unacceptable monopolies in many areas of the worldwide web.
Martian soil may contain toxic compounds harmful to life: NASA
By RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Martian soil could contain a toxic substance that would make it less likely that life formed there, data gathered by NASA's Phoenix lander on the red planet has revealed.
Earlier NASA said Phoenix analysers detected water in the soil, which suggested that Mars could have the conditions for life. However, if the presence of perchlorate were confirmed, the probability of detecting living organisms there would be reduced.
Scientists to discuss sex, love with robots
By DPA,
Amsterdam : Scientists plan to gather June 12 and 13 in the southern Dutch city of Maastricht to discuss the possibility of human beings increasingly engaging in personal and even romantic relationships with robots in the coming decades.
Academics from Austria, Canada, the Netherlands, Ireland, Singapore, the US and Britain are due to deliver some 20 presentations.
Space shuttle Discovery heads home after 14-day mission
By DPA,
Washington : The US space shuttle Discovery began its earthward journey Wednesday after completing a 14-day mission to carry out further construction and maintenance work on the International Space Station (ISS).
The shuttle is scheduled for landing Saturday at the Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Caneveral, Florida.
Discovery undocked from the ISS for the return journey after a mission in which astronauts carried out three spacewalks chiefly devoted to installing and preparing the Japanese scientific laboratory module Kibo.
Revolutionary nano-needle can peer into a cell
By IANS,
Washington : A revolutionary nano-needle, developed by researchers, not only peers into individual cells, but also acts as electro-chemical probe and optical biosensor.
"Nano-needle-based delivery is a powerful new tool for studying biological processes and biophysical properties at the molecular level inside living cells," said Min-Feng Yu, professor of mechanical science and study coauthor, University of Illinois (U of I).
‘The Twilight Saga: New Moon’ earns $72.7 mn, breaks opening day record
By IANS,
New York : "The Twilight Saga: New Moon" raked in an estimated $72.7 million on approximately 8,500 screens at 4,024 centres and has broken the record for the biggest one-day gross.
Director Chris Weitz's film beats out "The Dark Knight", which earned $67.2 million on around 9,300 screens at 4,366 centres.
Footpaths to generate electricity from pedestrians’ footsteps
By IANS,
London : A new technology under development by a British company would allow harnessing of the power of footsteps of pedestrians to generate electricity for lighting up public places.
The technology, developed by London-based The Facility, uses a flooring system that incorporates a matrix of hydraulic compression pads. The pressure of the footsteps on these pads pushes fluid through a micro-turbine and generates electricity.
NASA clicks first 3D image of the sun
By IANS,
London : A NASA-led mission has provided the world's first ever 3D image of the sun's surface.
Ocean sank 1,100 km into earth, raising chain of volcanic islands
By IANS,
Sydney : Researchers have discovered how an entire ocean destroyed itself 50 to 20 million years ago when its floor sank 1,100 km into the earth between Australia and New Zealand.
Using new computer modelling programmes, Monash University geoscientist Wouter Schellart was able to reconstruct the resulting cataclysm when the ocean's tectonic plate sank into the earth's interior, forming a long chain of volcanic islands at the surface.
Space shuttle Discovery moved to launch pad
By Xinhua
Washington : US space shuttle Discovery has been rolled out to its seaside launch pad in Florida in preparation for the Oct 23 launch to the International Space Station (ISS), according to NASA website updates.
The shuttle began its slow 5.5 km journey Sunday in the early morning darkness at Kennedy Space Centre in Florida. The crawler-transporter carrying the massive shuttle assembly arrived at the launch pad after about six hours.
Martian orbit on Indian spacecraft’s radar Wednesday
Bangalore : India's tryst with Mars begins early Wednesday when its inter-planetary spacecraft readies to enter the Martian orbit in a maiden attempt to...
Microsoft’s Kinect sets record as fastest-selling tech gadget
By DPA,
San Francisco : Microsoft's Kinect has been named the fastest-selling tech gadget of all time after racking up sales of 10 million units since its launch in November.
Space shuttle Endeavour returns to Earth after final mission
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : The space shuttle Endeavour landed at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida Wednesday bringing its 25th and final spaceflight to a close.
Endeavour blasts off for mission to space station
By DPA,
Washington : Space shuttle Endeavour lit up the Florida coast before dawn Monday as it blasted off for a mission to the International Space Station.
The start, at 10.14 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time was the final night-time launch for the ageing shuttle fleet, which is to be mothballed later this year.
Endeavour is carrying a six-window viewing area that will give astronauts a panoramic look at earth, the station and visiting spacecraft.
A planned Sunday launch for the shuttle had to be postponed due to low cloud cover at the launch site.
Six Taliban fighters killed in Afghanistan blast
Kabul: Six Taliban fighters were killed Saturday in a blast in Afghanistan's eastern province of Ghazni, police said.
"A local Taliban leader named Mullah Saddiq,...
Minorities lead digital take-up in Britain, but scared of internet banking
By IANS,
London : Indian and other minority groups are on the forefront of digital communications in Britain, with high levels of mobile phone, internet and multichannel television take-up, new research shows.
Research by Ofcom, the independent regulator and competition authority for the British communications industries, found that under-45s tend to be more engaged with digital media.
However, all four ethnic minority groups are also less likely than the British population as a whole to shop or bank online (19-29 percent compared to 41 percent), the research shows.
Dinosaur dance floor! Really?
By IANS,
Washington : Scientists who hiked recently to the northern Arizona wilderness site touted as a "dinosaur dance floor" found no sign of the extinct creatures but plenty of eroded potholes.
They saw dinosaur tracks en route, but none in the pockmarked "dance floor".
One of them, paleontologist Brent Breithaupt, director and curator of the University of Wyoming's Geological Museum, said "there simply are no tracks or real track-like features at this site. We will be investigating the formation of these features in the upcoming study."
Chandrayaan-1 in lunar orbit after successful manoeuvre
By NNN-PTI,
Bangalore, India : India's first unmanned spacecraft Chandrayaan-1 entered the lunar orbit on Saturday after ISRO scientists successfully carried out a highly complex and tricky manoeuvre crossing another historic milestone in the country's space programme.
ISRO scientists at the Mission Control Centre near here fired the spacecraft's liquid engine at 1651 hours for a duration of 817 seconds in a hit or miss Lunar Orbit Insertion(LOI) operation in the maiden moon mission, 18 days after it was launched from Sriharikota spaceport.
IBS Software wins ‘IT systems provider’ award
By IANS,
Thiruvananthapuram : IBS Software, IT systems provider to travel, transportation and logistics industries, Tuesday said it had won the 'IT Systems Provider of the Year' award at the Air Cargo India 2010 event in Mumbai.
"This award is a recognition of our success in introducing a new paradigm in IT solutions for business problems that plague the industry," Senior Vice President and Global Head of Cargo Line of Business for IBS Akshay Shrivastava said in a statement here.
Google allows Street View car inspection
By DPA,
Hamburg : Internet giant Google is to allow German data protection officers to examine one of its controversial Street View cars, which collect data for its online mapping service, the company announced Thursday.
Earlier this month, German officials were highly critical of a data protection gaffe which enabled the Google's vehicles to collect snippets of private data on unencrypted wifi networks as they trawled the streets gathering information to appear on Street View.
Nanotechnology sharply polarises people along cultural lines
By IANS,
Washington : Nanotech may be revolutionising research but it has also sharply polarised people along cultural lines, according to a study.
These findings have important implications for garnering support of the new technology, said Yale Law School (YLS) researchers, working in collaboration with a project on the emerging discipline.
The experiment involved a diverse sample of 1,500 Americans, the bulk of whom were unfamiliar with nanotechnology, a discipline that involves manipulation of atom sized particles, with wide commercial applications.
Microsoft delays Windows Vista switch to June 2008
By Xinhua
Beijing : Computer manufacturer feedback saying customers still want to purchase Windows XP has prompted Microsoft Corp. to delay a scheduled transition to its newer Windows Vista software to the end of June 2008.
The world's largest software maker introduced Windows Vista in January with the plan to phase out sales of its predecessor, Windows XP, by Jan. 30, 2008.
Pachauri advises Europe to follow Gandhian principle in tackling climate change
By EuAsiaNews
Brussels : Indian environmental scientist Rajendra Pachauri has said that Europe can set an example for the world in tackling climate change if it follows what it preaches.
"Within Europe itself the most apt philosophy or guiding principle would be what Mahatma Gandhi said, "be the change in what you want to see in the world,'' Pachauri told a session of the Climate Change Committee of the European Parliament in Brussels Wednesday evening.
World’s fastest supercomputer does in minutes what it took months to calculate
By IANS,
Washington : The world's fastest supercomputer called Jaguar, capable of quadrillion floating operations per second, has been housed at the Oak Ridge National Lab.
The blinding speed of Jaguar can be gauged by the fact that it just takes mere minutes to calculate what once took several months. Quadrillion is a figure in which one is followed by 15 zeroes or a million times billion).
Robots tread on thin ice when scientists fear
By IANS,
Washington : This is one machine that goes where humans fear to tread - on thin ice.
SnoMote - designed at Georgia Institute of Technology (GIT) and Pennsylvania State University - is a robot capable of negotiating volatile ice sheets as they crack, shift and fill with water.
The robot goes where it is impossible for scientists to walk and gets accurate measurement and inputs of ice sheets, something that lies beyond the ken of satellites.
Astronomers whip up recipe for moon concrete
By Xinhua,
Beijing : A team of astronomers have come up with an idea for a kind of lunar concrete that could be used to build structures on the moon such as giant telescopes, solar power arrays and even homes.
Telecommunication interconnection regulation revised
By IANS,
New Delhi : India's telecom watchdog Tuesday revised the Telecommunication (Broadcasting and Cable Services) Interconnection Regulation, 2004, making it mandatory for all broadcasters to have reference interconnect offers (RIOs) for their addressable systems.
The Telecommunication (Broadcasting and Cable Services) Interconnection (Fifth Amendment) Regulations, 2009, released by the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), covers regulatory provisions on issues relating to inter-connection for addressable platforms and registration of inter-connection agreements.
Scientists rush to southern India to study ‘Ring of Fire’
By Richa Sharma, IANS,
Kochi : It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and scientists from across the globe are thronging southern India to watch the 'Ring of Fire' during the millennium's longest annular solar eclipse Friday. The southern tips of Kerala and Tamil Nadu will offer the best view of the moon obscuring the sun.
’60 percent of country’s CO2 emissions are from power sector’
By IANS,
New Delhi : The power sector accounts for around 60 percent of the conuntry's carbon dioxide emissions, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said Wednesday.
"The power sector approximately accounts for 60 percent of the total carbon dioxide emissions generated in the country," Ramesh told the Lok Sabha in a written reply.
He said thermal power generation accounts for around 64 percent of the total power generation in the country.
Coal, gas and diesel-based power generation contribute approximately 82 percent, 17 percent and one percent of the thermal power generation.
Scientists find strange ring circling dead star
By Xinhua,
Washington : Using NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, scientists have found a bizarre ring of material around the magnetic remains of a star that blasted to smithereens, NASA reported Wednesday.
The stellar corpse, called SGR 1900+14, belongs to a class of objects known as magnetars. These are the cores of massive stars that blew up in supernova explosions, but unlike other dead stars, they slowly pulsate with X-rays and have tremendously strong magnetic fields.
NASA names planet after Kerala professor
By IANS,
New York/Kollam (Kerala) : In a rare honour, the US space agency NASA has named a 'minor' planet after a Kerala zoology professor in appreciation of his environmental research.
Sainudeen Pattazhy, who teaches in a college in Kollam, received a phone call from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory run by the space agency Wednesday that the minor planet '5178 CD4' has been named after him.
North Korea stops IAEA nuclear inspections
By DPA,
Vienna : North Korea informed the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Tuesday that it would stop all cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog immediately, IAEA spokesman Marc Vidricaire said.
IAEA inspectors are present in North Korea to monitor that the country's nuclear installations remain dismantled and turned off.
North Korea has informed the IAEA that it plans to reactivate all nuclear facilities, which include a reactor and a plant to reprocess spent nuclear fuel.
Japanese scientists plans to send paper airplane into space
By Xinhua
Beijing : Japanese scientists hope to send into space a craft made in the tradition of Japan's ancient art of paper folding and learn from its trip back to Earth, media reported Friday.
A successful flight from space by an origami plane could have far-reaching implications for the design of re-entry vehicles or space probes for upper atmospheric exploration, said project leader Shinji Suzuki, a professor at Tokyo University's Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
Discovery spacewalk postponed till Saturday
By RIA Novosti
Washington : Discovery shuttle planners have rescheduled a spacewalk to Saturday for fixing a ripped solar wing of the International Space Station (ISS), US space agency NASA's website said Thursday.
The spacewalk, originally due to take place Thursday, will be undertaken by Scott Parazynski and Doug Wheelock. The two astronauts plan to use the space station's robotic arm to fix the damaged solar wing.
Billions of life bearing planets float in the milky way
By IANS,
London : A few hundred thousand billion free-floating life-bearing earth-sized planets may exist in the space between stars in the Milky Way, says a study.
Rocket completes mission, India’s first moon spacecraft now in orbit
By Venkatachari Jagannathan and Fakir Balaji, IANS,
Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh) : With a perfect liftoff, India's first spacecraft to the moon entered its scheduled orbit early Wednesday, placing the country in a select group of six. The US, former Soviet Union, European Space Agency, China and Japan have sent spacecrafts to the moon earlier.
NASA says space shuttle repairs not needed
By RIA Novosti
Washington : There is no need to conduct repair work on the space shuttle Endeavour heat shield during the fourth spacewalk, scheduled for Aug 18, a NASA has said.
The damage to the heat shield occurred during Endeavour's launch Aug 8 when a small piece of insulating foam or ice from the shuttle fuel tank struck the spacecraft's underside shortly after lift off.
Russian bio-satellite makes safe landing
By RIA Novosti
Moscow : The re-entry module of the Foton-M bio-satellite successfully landed at 11.58 a.m. Moscow time (7.58 a.m. GMT) Wednesday in northern Kazakhstan, RIA Novosti reported.
The satellite was launched Sep 14 on a Soyuz rocket from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan carrying gerbils, snails, cockroaches and many other creatures sealed in special containers and filmed by a video camera during the flight, as part of experiments carried out by the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP).
Researchers perfecting technique to suck carbon from air
By IANS,
Sydney : Researchers are working on a new technique to extract carbon dioxide from the air and cut down pollution levels.
The research, being conducted by University of Tasmania, could also lead to methods of recycling climate change pollutants to become environmentally-friendly compounds.
Chief project investigator Brian Yates said the research was part of a broader project to develop a model for breaking strong bonds that form the components of molecules, and how these compounds react with metal complexes.
Microsoft, Mammootty to launch Kerala e-literacy programme
By IANS
Thiruvananthapuram : Software giant Microsoft and veteran Malayalam superstar Mammootty are planning to launch an e-literacy programme in Kerala.
Mammootty told IANS Tuesday that he is in discussions with Microsoft for the launch of the statewide education project.
He is also the brand ambassador of the state-sponsored Akshaya IT programme.
Mammootty said he wants to launch the project to help make all sections of the society IT literate.
Moon has deep core – similar to earth
By IANS,
Washington : The moon possesses an iron-rich core with a solid inner ball nearly 150 miles in radius, which is similar to that of the earth, according to a new study.
Manmohan Singh presented Chandrayaan-1, PSLV models
By IANS,
New Delhi : Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman G. Madhavan Nair Friday briefed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the success of India's maiden moon mission and presented him models of Chandrayaan-I and its launch vehiclE PSLV.
Nair briefed the prime minister about the launch sequence and subsequent maneuvering of the spacecraft to reach the final lunar orbit.
“The health of the spacecraft is good and all the operations so far have been implemented as planned,” the space department said in a statement quoting the conversation during the meeting.
China’s Internet users world’s largest
By IANS,
Beijing : China has overtaken the US and now has some 221 million web users - the world's largest Internet using population.
The number was 210 million by the end of last year, trailing the US by some five million, figures issued by the China Internet Network Information Centre showed.
Despite a rapidly increasing Internet population, China's ratio of Internet users to the total population is still lower than the global average, the ministry said.
Wi-fi in homes can be hacked in five seconds
By IANs,
London : Wireless internet networks in millions of homes can be hacked in less than five seconds.
Iran parliament approves law to implement n-deal
Tehran: Iran's parliament on Tuesday approved a legislation which asks the government to implement the recent nuclear deal reached between Tehran and the...
Space shuttle Discovery blasts off
By DPA,
Washington : Space shuttle Discovery blasted off in a midnight launch on a mission taking it to the International Space Station (ISS).
Discovery lifted off the launching pad at Cape Canaveral, Florida at 11.59 p.m. Friday (0359 GMT Saturday) after days of postponements due to a questionable valve on the shuttle's external fuel tank and poor weather.
New Mac system ‘Leopard’ shows Windows its claws
By DPA
Hamburg : Mac users were certainly in a hurry this time. Two million copies of the new Mac OS X Leopard operating system flew off store shelves in the first weekend it was sold.
Drawn in by over 300 new functions, long-time Apple users showed up in particularly large numbers to snap up the sixth version of the Mac OS X system.
Leopard is also intended to show some claws to the PC operating system Windows. Harry McCracken from the online magazine Slate even called the product "Apple's Microsoft-Devouring Jungle Cat."
No spaceship, yet NASA wants more astronauts
By IANS,
Washington : America's space organisation NASA has launched a massive recruitment drive to find new astronauts, despite not having its own spaceship for them to fly.
US, India high-technology meet Monday
By IANS,
Washington : Top US and Indian business executives will meet here Monday to address critical issues affecting US-India High Technology Cooperation in areas like defence/strategic trade, civil nuclear cooperation, biotechnology, nano-technology and civil aviation.
The private sector business interactions hosted by the US-India Business Council (USIBC) are expected to inform the official level bilateral discussions at a meeting of the US-India High Technology Cooperation Group (HTCG) Tuesday.
UAE to host global space technology meet next month
By IANS,
Abu Dhabi : An international meet on space technology will be held in the capital of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) next month to be attended by space scientists from across the world including those from the US, Europe and the UAE, WAM reported Thursday.
The three-day Global Space Technology Forum, the first of its kind in the Middle East, will be held Nov 16-18 at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre and will focus on new space technology and commercial markets, research and development, environment, energy and climate, among other things.
Remember the moon? NASA does, with 2020 vision
Washington, Dec 12 (DPA) Thirty-five years after the last man stood on the moon, the US space agency remains focused on returning humans to Earth's satellite as a launching pad for future exploration of Mars.
Never mind that the US public seemed more fixated on the high-profile arrest earlier this year of an astronaut caught in a jealous love triangle with a colleague, or that the long-delayed installation of a European module on the International Space Station (ISS) was again pushed back with the postponement of the Atlantis shuttle launch Sunday.
Giant planet outside solar system discovered
By IANS
Santiago de Compostela (Spain) : A group of astronomers at the Universidad de Santiago de Compostela (USC) has discovered a huge planet in the star system Gliese 22, Spain's EFE news agency reported Wednesday.
The finding has been reported in the Astronomy and Astrophysics magazine.
Big and thin: PC monitors better than ever
By DPA
Berlin : Chunky, heavy tube monitors appear to have reached the end of their long run as the king of the computer workspace. A hefty competition is under way among flat monitors. The goal: bigger, broader and more handsome.
"Seventeen-inch monitors are already becoming extinct, and 19 inch has become the standard," says Dirk Lorenz from the German consumer-testing organisation Stiftung Warentest in Berlin.
As monitors get bigger, more of them come in wide screen format. That means a 16:10 size ratio instead of the old fashioned 4:3 ratio.
Abu Dhabi to host international IT conference
By IANS/WAM,
Abu Dhabi: Abu Dhabi will host an international conference on information technology supported by the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Global CEO Clubs to enter India’s IT hub
By IANS,
Bangalore : CEO Clubs, an exclusive club for chief executives worldwide, will launch its new chapter in India's IT hub Monday to create a platform for interaction and exchange of ideas for its members running global enterprises.
To mark the occasion, the Bangalore chapter of CEO Clubs India, the second in the country after the Delhi chapter, will organise a panel discussion on the impact of global recession and what difference such a club will make to Indian chief executives of diverse enterprises and corporates.
UFO seen at China airport
By IANS,
Beijing : Air traffic at an airport in China was restricted for about an hour after a UFO was spotted over it, media reports said Thursday.
Science alliance strengthened during Merkel’s India visit
By T. V. Padma, IANS
New Delhi : The deepening and strengthening scientific collaboration between India and Germany, that included the setting up of a joint science and technology centre here, was in some ways overshadowed by the media focus on the nuclear deal during Chancellor Angela Merkel's visit this week.
The two nations have agreed to enhance collaboration and networking across a range of issues, with a focus on reducing the impact of climate change and developing clean energy technologies, according to the science portal www.scidev.net.
Device tracks and delivers virus count in minutes
By IANS,
Sydney : You may be ingesting dangerous nano-particles emitted by a car and billions of viruses might be infesting your system especially if you have a virulent infection.
qViro is a revolutionary invention that offers the potential to quickly and cheaply answer these questions. The coffee grinder sized, portable desk top instrument can count the number of viruses in a sample in minutes, powered by a computer drive.
India marks ‘Ring of Fire’ spectacle with faith and science
By IANS,
New Delhi : Millions of Hindus bathed in holy rivers and tanks across India after a four-hour celestial spectacle that turned the sun into a 'Ring of Fire', bringing out science enthusiasts to view and record the rare event.
Hundreds of thousands of temples all over the country closed their doors and covered their deities with muslin shrouds during the period when traffic on roads in many cities thinned as people kept indoors.
Women better than men in clinching business deals
By IANS,
London : Although few women occupy top slots in corporate hierarchies, a new study shows that they may be more accomplished in negotiations than their masculine counterparts.
Yael Itzhaki of Tel Aviv University carried out simulations of business negotiations among 554 Israeli and American management students at Ohio State University and in Israel, reported EurekAlert.
New iguana species found in Fiji
By IANS,
Sydney : A new species of iguana, found by Australian and US researchers in central Fiji, takes the number of such existing Pacific species to three.
Scientists named the new iguana species Brachylophus bulabula. Bulabula is a doubling of bula, the Fijian word for 'hello,' thus signifying an even more enthusiastic greeting.
Retaining talent major challenge for Indian scientific organisations
By Venkatachari Jagannathan, IANS,
Chennai : Retaining an experienced nuclear scientist has become a major challenge now for the Indian nuclear establishment, with the private sector casting its net wide for talent, says a top scientist.
"Last year we lost around five percent of our scientists and engineers. Ten of them were groomed by me over two decades," Baldev Raj, director of the Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR), told IANS in an interview.
According to him, managing a scientific research organisation is tougher than running a company.
Air Pegasus’s Bengaluru-Madurai service soon
Bengaluru: Low-cost carrier Air Pegasus will begin flying from here to Tamil Nadu's Madurai from June 26, spreading its footprint to the fourth city...
Space taxis: Bold new era or death of manned exploration?
By Anne K. Walters, DPA,
Cape Canaveral (Florida) : The massive cement expanses that dot the flat Florida landscape have been launching pads for history: the first US astronauts blasted into orbit, the Apollo missions to the moon and nearly 30 years of space shuttle flights. But human space travel from Kennedy Space Centre will soon come to a halt.
After nearly three decades, the space shuttle programme is set to come to a close in September.
Your body heat could power future devices
New York, July 1 (IANS) A new way of powering gadgets using simply a person's own body heat has been developed by an American company that specialises in green power sources.
How do bees land on the spot? Indian-origin scientist finds out
By IANS,
Sydney : A study led by a scientist of Indian-origin has decoded the tricky art of landing by honey bees, a finding that can have huge implications in making better robot planes.
An automatic landing system for an aircraft is expensive and complex. And it is just one of many systems that is required to make a truly robotic aircraft. But a bee can take off, find targets, fly through tunnels, navigate home and land without any of that complexity.
Microsoft launches anti-piracy campaign in 49 countries
By IANS,
New Delhi : In its bid to clamp down on rampant software piracy, Microsoft Tuesday announced a global initiative under the banner of 'Global Anti-Piracy Awareness Day' that will include educating consumers as well as enforcing legal action.
Even though the initiative was rolled out in 49 countries, Microsoft's director of intellectual property in Australia told the Sydney Morning Herald newspaper that the Redmond-based software giant would not be able to solve the problem fully ever.
Astronauts replace failed electric motor of space station
By Xinhua
Beijing : Two U.S. astronauts replaced a failed electric motor and gave the international space station a much-needed power boost, which added to the power margin at the orbiting outpost and cleared the way for deliveries of two science labs, media reports said Thursday.
Beijing : Two U.S. astronauts replaced a failed electric motor and gave the international space station a much-needed power boost, which added to the power margin at the orbiting outpost and cleared the way for deliveries of two science labs, media reports said Thursday.
Sukhoi keen on aircraft plant at Nagpur
By IANS,
Nagpur : Russian plane maker Sukhoi and Malaysia-based SKS Ventures have offered to set up an aircraft manufacturing plant and a special economic zone for production of renewable energy equipment components, besides developing a new airport at Nagpur, it was announced here Friday.
Move over Orkut, here comes India’s BigAdda
By Azera Rahman, IANS
New Delhi : Check the scribbles in your phone scrapbook, send friend requests on the wireless, have discussions in as many as eight different languages...all on India's social networking site, BigAdda, which could give Orkut and Facebook a run for its money.
With an estimated 1.24 million users so far, this five-month old networking site is fast catching up among Indian youth, especially in tier 2 cities like Guwahati, Nashik, Surat, Tuticorin, Bhilai and Amritsar.
Oriya portal offers free breaking news on mobile phone
By IANS
Bhubaneswar : An Oriya news portal is offering free news briefs to all its readers through SMS.
The portal, www.odisha.com, has introduced the service after a tie-up with SMSGupShup, a free group messaging service provided by Mumbai-based Webaroo Technology India Pvt Ltd.
The portal already introduced last month a premium local breaking news service for mobile subscribers. It has now said it would also provide the news for free. The free news would contain advertisements.
‘Amazon to give away Kindle readers to thwart iPad threat’
By DPA,
San Francisco: Amazon wants to start giving away its Kindle electronic reader to thwart the threat posed by Apple's new iPad, according to a report Friday by the influential technology site TechCrunch.com.
The report said that Amazon would start by providing the $259 device to subscribers of Amazon Prime, a $79 per year service that gives customers free two-day shipping on everything they buy from the web retail giant.
Bees beat computers in solving complex problems
By IANS,
London : Bees solve complex maths problems in a jiffy, compared to computers, which can take much longer, a study shows.
Researchers rely on 3-D imaging to detect autism early
By IANS,
Washington : Researchers are examining 3-D imaging to reveal correlations in facial features and brain structures of autistic children, in a bid to develop a formula for the condition's earlier detection.
Autism is a brain disorder characterised by a complex of social, communication and behavioural difficulties.
“Noah’s ark of plant life” launched in Arctic
By Xinhua
Beijing : A vault dubbed "Noah's ark of plant life" has been launched in the permafrost of a remote Arctic mountain to protect the world's crop seeds from man-made and natural disasters.
An opening ceremony was conducted Tuesday at the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, as 100 million seeds from more than 100 countries were placed inside. The first day's deposits comprised 268,000 samples and filled 676 boxes.
NASA obtains detailed map of moon’s south pole
By Xinhua
Washington : The US National Aeronautics and Space Administrations (NASA) announced here that it has obtained the highest resolution images to date of the moon's rugged south polar region.
Scientists at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory collected the data using the facility's Goldstone Solar System Radar located in California's Mojave Desert.
"We now know the south pole has peaks as high as Mt. McKinley and crater floors four times deeper than the Grand Canyon.
Italian connection on the cards for Kerala’s Technopark
By IANS
Thiruvananthapuram : A delegation from Novara, one of the most industrially advanced cities in Italy, held discussions here Thursday for possible cooperation in IT between Novara and Technopark.
The Italian delegation included the mayor of Novara, Massimo Giordano, and four lawyers.
In his speech, Giordano suggested companies here and Novara should collaborate and work for mutual benefit.
He invited officials here to visit Novara for further talks.
Promising carbon material can act as power reservoir
By IANS,
Washington : A breakthrough in use of 'grahpene', a single-atom thick, carbon-based material, will make massive storage of wind power and solar energies possible.
Texan University researchers believe the breakthrough could double the capacity of existing ultracapacitors (which store electric energy) made out of a different form of carbon.
US solar industry ‘injured’ by Chinese solar cells
By IANS,
Beijing : The solar industry in America was "materially injured" by imports of solar cells from China, a US trade panel has claimed.