Three rules ‘must’ for optimising technology use for progress
By IANS,
Washington : Use of technology can be optimised for ensuring social progress if policy makers are clear about how to apply it and know what to expect from their efforts.
Daniel Sarewitz of Arizona State University (ASU) and Richard Nelson of Columbia University described three rules that can help technology and science policy makers become smarter about where to apply technological fixes and what to expect as a result.
India to launch ocean-watching satellite this month
By IANS,
Chennai : Some time between Sep 20 and 25, India will launch a specialised satellite to watch over the Indian Ocean, an official of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said Monday.
Oceansat 2 will be launched by the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) into a sun-synchronous orbit 720 km above the earth, the official said on phone from ISRO's launch centre at Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh), 70 km from here.
The PSLV will also carry a number of small "nano" satellites, the official said on condition of anonymity as he is not authorised to speak to the media.
Space shuttle Endeavour lands safely after successful mission
By RIA Novosti,
Washington : The US space shuttle Endeavour has made a successful landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California after being forced to abandon plans to land in Florida, US space agency Nasa said.
The shuttle touched down at 4.25 p.m. (2125 GMT) Sunday.
The crew was unable to return to Nasa's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the initial landing site, due to weather concerns, Nasa said.
Endeavour will now travel some 2,500 miles from California to Florida on the back of a modified 747 jumbo jet within the next seven to 10 days.
Beware of e-mail scam offering to ‘rescue’ friends
By Frederick Noronha, IANS
Panaji : Goa-based Rudolf Ludwig's friends started getting frantic e-mail messages about the musician-turned-art gallery owner being stranded in Nigeria and badly in need of money.
His wife Yolanda fielded off telephone calls to their Goa home, explaining that nothing of this sort had happened.
When more friends started phoning in, Ludwig, who was very much in Goa, realised his e-mail account on the popular GMail network had been hacked into. His password had been changed and he couldn't enter his own account.
Russia launches Proton-M rocket with Dutch telesat
By IANS,
Moscow: Russia conducted the launch of a Proton-M rocket with a telecommunications satellite late Monday.
India seeks inclusion in Russian space station project
By RIA Novosti
Moscow : India has expressed its intention to participate in the Russian International Space Station construction project, according to Russian space agency head Anatoly Perminov.
"As regards the list of nations wishing to join in the construction and operation of the International Space Station, India has recently applied," Roskosmos chief said last week.
He added that India was a major space power with a series of achievements in non-manned aerospace projects, and would like to make a contribution to the space station project.
China warns of Valentine’s Day computer viruses
By Xinhua
Tianjin (China) : China's anti-virus authorities have warned computer users to guard against Valentine's Day computer viruses.
Valentine's Day computer viruses especially "Vbs_Valentin.A" spread chiefly through e-mails or online chat systems such as MSN and QQ, the experts from Tianjin-based China National Computer Virus Emergency Response Centre warned.
Other viruses like "Worm-blebla.B" and "VBS-ILoveyou" infect computers if users open e-mails or attachments disguised as Valentine's Day greetings.
ITC plans greenfield paper plant, major hotel expansion
By IANS,
Kolkata: Tobacco-to-hotels major ITC Ltd is planning to set up a $1-billion greenfield paper plant and expand its hotel business, a top company official said here Friday.
"We are looking at an investment of Rs.4,000-5,000 crore for paper plant. The paper plant is likely to require 1,500-2,000 acres," ITC chairman Y.C. Deveshwar said.
The company is scouting for land in three states - Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Andhra Pradesh - but has not been successful in bagging any plot yet.
Office 2010: Did Microsoft get it right?
By Jay Dougherty, DPA,
Washington : Will Office 2010 rescue Microsoft's ubiquitous productivity suite in the same way that Windows 7 resuscitated the reputation of Windows?
That's the billion-dollar question. And this week, with the official unveiling of Office 2010, answers begin to emerge.
Boasting a host of collaborative features, interface improvements, and seamless integration with the new, free Office 2010 Web Apps, Office 2010 is Microsoft's best attempt to redress the complaints that users had about Office 2007 while not throwing out the 2007 experiment entirely.
Climate change will set back ozone layer recovery: NASA
By IANS,
Washington : Global warming will set back the recovery of the ozone layer of the earth's atmosphere, warns a NASA study.
Previous studies have shown that while the build up of greenhouse gases makes it warmer in the troposphere, up to 10 km high from sea level, these gases actually cool the upper stratosphere, between 30 to 50 km high.
This cooling slows the chemical reactions that deplete ozone in the upper stratosphere and allows natural ozone production in that region to outpace destruction of the ozone layer by chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs).
New ‘MeGa’ sensor to monitor carbon dioxide concentration
By IANS,
Washington : A novel tube-like sensor would now make monitoring gas concentrations possible over a large area, both cheaply and effectively, doing the work of a number of existing sensors.
Known as membrane-based gas sensors or 'MeGa', they are likely to be used in monitoring underground presence of carbon dioxide in gas pipelines or sewers.
The probe can also be useful in monitoring water bodies, for example, observation of hydrogen sulphide formation, including groundwater, and for monitoring boreholes.
Digital invasion of privacy just a step away: Experts
By IANS,
London : Digital invasion of privacy is a step closer to reality, thanks to an increasingly intrusive technology that can track every single movement of ours or the words that we whisper.
The combination of information and communication technologies and pervasive computing will soon help continuously monitor individual activity, beyond what was feared by George Orwell in 1984, warned social psychologist Saadi Lahlou and other experts in a special report.
Mars rover Opportunity takes dip into giant crater
By Xinhua
Washington : NASA's Mars rover Opportunity entered Victoria Crater for the first time to explore the richest science trove of its long mission.
On the rover's 1,291st Martian day, Opportunity radioed home information via a relay by NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter, reporting its activities for the day, according to NASA mission updates Tuesday.
Russia may build its own particle collider
By RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Russia is looking into the possibility of building its own particle collider for research and other projects, a Russian scientist has said.
Viktor Matveev said Thursday that scientists around the world are currently considering a proposal by their Russian colleagues to build a new collider.
The idea was put forward by scientists from the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, who suggested that a new device be built in the Moscow region.
Scientists find way of protecting computers against virus
By IANS,
Washington : Code Red, a virulent computer virus, wreaked havoc, infecting more than 350,000 machines in 14 hours in 2001, besides causing a worldwide loss of $2.6 billion.
Now techies at Ohio State University have discovered a way to contain worms like Code Red, which blocked network traffic to subway stations and 911 call centres in the US, and also sought to target the White House website.
"We wanted to find a way to catch infections in their earliest stages, before they get that far," said Ness Shroff, who led the team that worked on the project.
Geologist launches e-journal
By IANS,
Lucknow : A scientist from the Geological Survey India (GSI) has launched a free e-journal to help students and others interested in geological studies.
Lucknow-based Satish Tripathi says it can be accessed after logging on to www.earthscienceindia.info
"By logging on, one can get queries pertaining to Planet Earth answered by renowned geologists of the world who are members of the journal," Tripathi told IANS here.
British scientists unfold new frontiers of biotechnology
By IANS
Chennai : Will duckweed and algae be floating down Indian rivers soon, cleaning up waste and generating bio-fuel?
That is what researchers in Britain are doing, and some of Britain's top cell scientists are on a weeklong tour of India to talk about frontiers biotechnology.
Their effort is being matched by some of India's own scientists explaining the country's attempts in the field, in a joint initiative of the British Council and the Centre for Biotechnology (CBT) at the Anna University here.
Partial solar eclipse in UAE
By NNN-WAM,
Abu Dhabi : The United Arab Emirates and other countries of the region, including Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, eastern parts of Saudi Arabia and northern parts of Palestine and Jordan, witnessed a partial solar eclipse today.
Emirates Astronomy Society deployed an observatory in the breakwaters area to monitor the different stages of eclipse. The eclipse lasted for about 95 minutes, reaching its peak at 3:29 p.m.
Mohammad Shawkat, Head of the Society said the eclipse occurred when the new moon moved directly between the sun and the earth.
Methane found on Jupiter-sized extra-solar planet
By IANS
Washington : For the first time ever, astronomers have detected an organic molecule - which plays a key role in the formation of life - on a planet circling a nearby star.
The methane molecule has been detected by the Hubble Space Telescope in the atmosphere of the Jupiter-sized planet named HD 189733b, located 63 light-years away in the constellation Vulpecula, or the little fox.
Under right circumstances, methane can play a key role in pre-biotic (life forming) chemistry
India Actively Considering Sending Man Into Space: Chavan
By Bernama,
New Delhi : India is gearing up for the launch of its maiden moon mission Chandrayaan-I later this year and the government is actively considering sending a man into space, Minister of State in PMO Prithviraj Chavan said Wednesday.
Integration of 11 experiments -- five Indian and six foreign -- is proceeding satisfactorily and scientists are looking forward to a launch in the third quarter, the Press Trust of India (PTI) quoted him as saying, in replying to supplementary questions in the Lower house of Parliament.
Mobile retailer Svyaznoy to open Apple stores in Russia
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow: Mobile retailer Svyaznoy plans to launch Apple Premium Reseller mono-brand stores in 10 Russian cities.
China Mobile tests signal station on Mount Everest
By DPA
Beijing : China Mobile has successfully tested a mobile signal station built on Mount Everest at 6,500 metres ahead of next year's Olympic torch relay on the highest peak of the world.
The world's highest mobile telecommunications station was tested Tuesday on the 8,844-metre-high mountain, the official China Daily quoted the country's main mobile service provider, China Mobile, as saying.
Monkey uses its head – and a robotic arm!
By IANS,
Washington : Using signals from its brain and nothing else, a monkey has activated a human-like robotic arm to feed itself.
This advance is likely to spur development of prosthetics for those with spinal cord injuries and with “locked-in” conditions such as Lou Gehrig's disease, or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
“Our immediate goal is to make a prosthetic device for people with total paralysis,” said Andrew Schwartz of the University of Pittsburgh and co-author of the study involving the monkey.
Ten technologies which MIT sees as impacting lives
By IANS,
New York : Technology Review, the magazine of innovation brought out by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Tuesday announced its annual list of 10 top emerging technologies, seen to impact the way we live and do business.
"These revolutionary innovations - each represented by a researcher whose vision and work is driving the field - promise fundamental shift in areas from energy to health care, computing to communications," the magazine said.
Virus of infidelity infects 76 percent of relationships: Study
By IANS,
Washington : Infidelity is widespread with people tending to cheat on their partners very often, which may be as high as 40 to 76 percent, according to a study.
The probability of someone cheating... (is) very high," said Geneviève Beaulieu-Pelletier, doctoral student at the Université de Montréal's Department of Psychology.
Google offers to 3D map Goa
Panaji : Goa may soon be one of the first states in India to have a 3D digitized mapped presence online if the state...
US and Russian satellites collide in space
By DPA,
Washington/Moscow : A US satellite was destroyed in an unprecedented collision with a spent Russian satellite, raising fears of danger to other satellites, a report said Thursday.
The collision between Iridium-33, a commercial US communications satellite and Russia's Cosmos 2251 satellite, which had been turned off for years, occurred Tuesday at 04:55 GMT above Siberia at a height of 790 km, the space.com site said, quoting a statement by US space agency NASA.
Computers can only figure out a painting’s intricacies
By IANS,
London : Computers can pretty well figure out the colour composition or aesthetics of paintings, but still lag behind humans in interpreting art.
How does one place an artwork in a particular artistic period? This is the question raised by scientists from the Laboratory of Graphics and Image in the University of Girona and the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Germany.
India emerging as global hub for data hosting services
By Fakir Balaji, IANS,
Mumbai/Bangalore : Convergence of technologies, domain expertise and falling bandwidth tariffs are making India a hot data hosting and remote infrastructure management (RIM) site for global enterprises, says a top industry player.
For the next wave of outsourcing in back office operations, top Indian players such as Reliance Infocomm, Tata Telecommunications, Sify and Netmagic Solutions are bracing up to provide a range of IT managed services, including data hosting, mission critical applications, networking and RIM to domestic and overseas enterprises.
Bio-nanotechnology will help India’s food security: Pawar
By IANS
New Delhi : Advances in the area of bio-nanotechnology would go a long way in helping India's food security, Minister for Food and Agriculture Sharad Pawar said here Wednesday.
"Bio-nanotechnology takes agriculture from the era of genetically modified (GM) crops to the brave new world of atomically modified organisms," Pawar said, speaking at the inaugural session of the three-day Fifth Knowledge Millennium Summit on "B2B Bio and Nanotechnology" organised by industry body Assocham.
Car ads don’t tell whole truth about emissions
By IANS,
Sydney : Ads prompting you to buy a swanky new car might not be telling the whole truth; at least not about the bit on greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution, despite global concerns.
These findings are based on an analysis of 514 vehicle ads appearing in two popular magazines like North & South and Metro over a five-year period from 2001 to 2005, by the University of Otago, Wellington.
The results showed that only three percent of the ads provided information on fuel efficiency and only four percent on greenhouse gas (carbon dioxide) and air pollution emissions.
China’s first lunar probe completes long journey to moon successfully
By Xinhua
Beijing : China's first lunar probe, Chang'e-1, completed its nearly two-million-km journey to the moon successfully Wednesday and entered its working orbit.
The probe, following instructions of the Beijing Aerospace Control Centre (BACC), started its third braking at 8.24 a.m. and entered a 127-minute round polar circular orbit at 8.34 a.m.
"It marks success of the probe's long flight to the moon," said Luan Enjie, chief commander of China's lunar probe project.
Helmet-crested, duck-billed dinosaur discovered
By Xinhua
Beijing : U.S., Mexican and Canadian scientists on Tuesday announced the discovery of helmet-crested, duck-billed dinosaur that lived about 7 million years ago.
The composition of its skull -- with a nose on top of its head and elongated nasal passages -- meant its call was probably one of its most unique aspects, said Terry Gates, a Utah Museum of Natural History paleontologist.
Beijing : U.S., Mexican and Canadian scientists on Tuesday announced the discovery of helmet-crested, duck-billed dinosaur that lived about 7 million years ago.
The composition of its skull -- with a nose on top of its head and elongated nasal passages -- meant its call was probably one of its most unique aspects, said Terry Gates, a Utah Museum of Natural History paleontologist.
Bangaloreans upset as clouds play spoilsport during eclipse
By IANS,
Bangalore : Compromising on their daily dose of sleep, hundreds of Bangaloreans woke up early morning to witness the century's longest solar eclipse Wednesday, but clouds played spoilsport during their much awaited adventure.
Around 200 scientists, research scholars and other people gathered at the Lalbagh Botanical Garden at 5.30 a.m. here but thick clouds unfortunately came in their way to witnessing the celestial spectacle.
Wireless spectrum assessment to be over by September
By IANS
Chennai : The assessment of the availability of the wireless spectrum for communication services is likely to be over by the first week of September, IT and Communications Minister A. Raja said here Thursday.
Raja was speaking on the sidelines of a function to inaugurate global computer giant IBM's sixth global delivery centre in India, to be housed in Chennai.
He said once the defence ministry freed some of the spectrum it held, his ministry would be able to provide more communication depth.
U.S. spacecraft finds Mars colder than expected
By Xinhua,
Washington : NASA announced on Thursday that new observations from its Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter indicate that the crust and upper mantle of Mars are stiffer and colder than previously thought.
The findings suggest any liquid water that might exist below the planet's surface and any possible organisms living in that water would be located deeper than scientists had suspected.
Little fossils show how cooling oceans increased life forms
By IANS,
Sydney : Microscopic tooth-like fossils have helped scientists correlate cooling climate and increasing biodiversity in ancient oceans 500 million years ago.
An international team led by Julie Trotter of Australian National University (ANU) Research School of Earth Sciences (RSES) measured the oxygen isotope ratio of the fossils, less than two mm long, from extinct eel-shaped sea creatures called conodonts.
The oxygen isotope ratio in a conodont depends on the temperature of the water which the creature inhabited.
Google Earth helps youth to trace lost home – after 13 years
By Brij Khandelwal, IANS
Agra : Orphaned at seven, he ran away from home to escape the tyranny of his uncle and was taken care of by an affluent Muslim family in northern India. Now at 20, Rakesh Singh has through Google Earth traced his village near Agra and is fighting to get his property back.
Rakesh, who developed an early fascination for computers, has found his village in Kiraoli, about 22 km from the Taj Mahal city, thanks to his interest in the internet.
Massive supernova visible from Earth
By IANS,
London : A supernova millions of light years away from the Earth has become visible with a pair of binoculars.
Moon, Venus, Mercury to align for Buenos Aires residents
By Xinhua
Buenos Aires : The Moon, Mercury and Venus are going to align at 5:46 a.m. (0746 GMT) Wednesday, which can be spotted with naked eye by residents in the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires, a local astronomical club announced Monday.
The planet lineup is expected to start at 5:20 a.m. Wednesday when the Moon first ascends, followed by Mercury at 5:34 a.m. and Venus at 5:46 a.m., according to the Astronomy Friends Association.
Atlantis shuttle returns safely to Florida
By DPA
Washinton : Space Shuttle Atlantis touched down safely at Florida's Kennedy Space Center Wednesday morning after a near 13-day mission to the International Space Station.
"We appreciate all the great help and support," Commander Steve Frick told NASA's mission control in Houston after the shuttle came to a stop at 9:08 a.m. (1408 GMT).
Frick and his six crewmembers returned to Earth after bringing up and installing the Columbus laboratory on the ISS - Europe's most significant contribution to the space station so far.
TV signals caused Russian rocket to miss ISS: NASA
By DPA,
Moscow/Washington : Television signals caused a Russian cargo rocket to miss its rendezvous with the International Space Station (ISS), NASA officials said Saturday.
The engineers indicated they would avoid activating the system during Sunday's second attempt to dock, NASA officials said.
The Progress 38 cargo rocket missed its rendezvous with the ISS by three km late Friday. A new effort to dock is to be made at 1600 GMT Sunday and be broadcast life on NASA television.
AITA clears the air over project Apollo Mission 2018
By IANS,
New Delhi : The All India Tennis Association (AITA) secretary Anil Khanna Monday was at pains to explain that the apex organisation of the game was only trying to bring about transparency in the sponsorship world and it had nothing to do with Mahesh Bhupathi as a media report suggested.
Khanna said that AITA was not interested in kicking up an unnecessary controversy, it only sought to check the veracity of ads in the media about a corporate - Apollo Tyres - in quest of producing Grand Slam champions.
Chandrayaan enters lunar space for final journey
By IANS,
Bangalore : India's first moon mission Chandrayaan-1 entered the lunar space early Tuesday for its final journey into the lunar orbit Saturday, an official of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said.
"The operation to put Chandrayaan into lunar space went off very well. The complex manouvre was carried out around 5 a.m. by firing the liquid apogee motor (LAM) on board for about 150 seconds to place the unmanned spacecraft 380,000 km away from earth (apogee) and 1,000 km from the moon," ISRO director S. Satish told IANS.
US commercial cargo capsule launched to space station
By IANS,
Washington : An unmanned rocket carrying the Dragon cargo capsule blasted off Friday to deliver the second commercial shipment to the International Space Station.
China for ‘constructive role’ in Iranian nuclear talks
By Xinhua,
Sanya (China) : China has expressed its willingness to play a "constructive role" in the negotiations on the Iranian nuclear crisis.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao said his country respects Iran's nuclear programme meant for peaceful purposes and is willing to play a mediator's role in the talks to resolve the standoff.
How hot was earth 50 million years ago?
By IANS,
Washington : A much clearer picture of the Earth's temperature nearly 50 million years ago, when Carbon Dioxide (CO2) concentrations were higher than current levels, has emerged.
Google 3D medical browser maps human body
By IANS,
London : Google has developed a new browser that maps the human body in detail.
Cuba overhauls communications, IT sectors
By IASN/EFE,
Havana: The government has launched an overhaul of Cuba's communications and information technology sectors, the Communist Party daily Granma said.
Delhi sees annular solar eclipse but clouds play spoilsport
By IANS,
New Delhi : The millennium's longest annular solar eclipse was partially seen in the national capital Friday but cloudy skies marred a clear view of the celestial spectacle. The weather, however, failed to puncture the spirit of enthusiastic students who had gathered at the Nehru Planetarium to view the rare event.
Scores of people gathered at the planetarium. So much was the excitement that officials at the planetarium admitted they were "nervous" about managing the crowd.
ISRO to set up astronaut training institute
By IANS,
Bangalore : Buoyed by the successful launch of the country's maiden unmanned moon mission Chandrayaan-1, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is all set to start an institute to train astronauts for its planned first manned space mission by 2015, said a top official.
Russian Proton-M carrier rocket orbits U.S. telecoms satellite
By RIA Novosti,
Moscow : A Proton-M carrier rocket put into orbit on Wednesday a U.S. telecommunications satellite, the Russian Federal Space Agency said.
"The foreign satellite has successfully separated from the Breeze-M booster, and control over the satellite has been transferred to the client," the agency said.
Russian-American joint venture International Launch Services (ILS) signed a contract in March to launch two Sirius satellites to expand the existing SIRIUS Satellite Radio constellation.
5,000-year-old village ruins found in China
By IANS,
Beijing : Archaeologists in China have found the ruins of two 5,000-year-old villages in Mongolia.
The ruins in Hamin'aile village in Tongliao city in Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region have been identified as possibly originating from Hongshan culture, dating back 5,000 years, said Ji Ping, a researcher at the Institute of Cultural and Historical Relics and Archaeology.
About 1,200 square metres have been excavated, and houses and tombs had been found, China Daily reported.
420 mn Chinese now use the internet
By IANS,
Beijing : The number of Chinese internet users has reached a staggering 420 million, authorities said.
Website sina.com.cn citing a report published by China Internet Network Information Center (CINIC) reported that 277 million people access the internet via cell phones.
The population of China's internet users climbed to 420 million as of June 2010, 36 million more than at the end of 2009.
China Daily Wednesday reported that broadband was the most popular way to access the internet, instead of a wired connection.
Nokia touch screen phone by year end
By Himank Sharma, IANS,
New Delhi : Setting at rest speculations, cell phone major Nokia has confirmed it will launch a full touch screen handset by the end of this year.
"We have been working on the Series 60 platform for touch screen user interface and a mobile device is expected to be launched by the year-end," Devinder Kishore, Nokia India's marketing director, told IANS.
Chandrayaan in final lunar orbit
By IANS,
Bangalore : India's first unmanned lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 was placed in its final orbit of 100 km from the lunar surface, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced here Wednesday evening.
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.
Scientific community celebrates successful launch of Chandrayaan-1
By IANS,
Bangalore : It is a time for jubilation for the scientific community of India and they are cherishing every moment of it with the successful launch of Chandrayaan-1 early Wednesday.
The Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, India's first unmanned scientific mission to the moon, blasted off successfully towards destination moon from Sriharikota, about 80 km from Chennai.
With the successful launch of Chandrayaan-1, India now has joined an exclusive club of nations including the US, former Soviet Union, European Space Agency, China and Japan to have sent missions to moon.
Russia builds world’s largest telescope in Antarctica
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : The construction of the world's largest telescope, worth $271 million, will be completed in 2011, Russian space agency Roscosmos said.
"The telescope's size exceeds the overall height of the Empire State Building, the Sears Tower in Chicago and the Shanghai World Financial Centre," Roscosmos said.
The IceCube telescope designed by researchers and engineers from the University of Wisconsin and sponsored by the National Science Foundation will be inserted into the ice near the South Pole.
Scientists turn ancient cockroach fossil into 3-D model
By IANS,
London : An early cockroach ancestor that lived around 300 million years ago was unveiled in unprecedented detail here in a new 3-D 'virtual fossil' model.
Scientists at Imperial College London (ICL) made a comprehensive 3D model of a fossilised specimen called Archimylacris eggintoni, which is an ancient ancestor of modern cockroaches and termites.
This insect scuttled around on earth during the Carboniferous period 359-299 million years ago, which was a time when life had recently emerged from the oceans to live on land.
ISRO land deal rocks Kerala assembly
By IANS
Thiruvananthapuram : The opposition Congress Tuesday walked out of the Kerala assembly over the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) purchasing 82 acres of forest land to set up a space education institute.
The trouble began when senior Congress legislator Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan sought leave for an adjournment motion and sought a discussion into the deal - ISRO purchased the land in Ponmudi, 75 km from here, from high profile businessman Savy Mano Mathew.
The Congress alleges that the land belongs to the forest department of the government.
GSLV mission: Scientists say cryogenic engine had ignited
By IANS,
Thiruvananthapuram : A team of Indian space scientists has established that the indigenously built cryogenic engine had ignited for a second during the failed GSLV mission Thursday.
"This took place for a second and then the fuel supply to power turbo got blocked. The (Indian Space Research Organisation) chairman and we knew this on Thursday but then we wanted to be doubly sure about it. And now this has been substantiated with the data. By all means this is a great achievement," said a senior scientist who did not wish to be identified.
Magic of 3G services in India, PM launches ‘Jaadu’
By IANS,
New Delhi : Indian users can now access a range of multiple utilities on their mobile phones as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Thursday launched the state-run Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd's (MTNL) third generation (3G) service, called 'Jaadu' or magic.
"I congratulate MTNL and the communications minister for launching the 3G service," the prime minister said.
Atlantis on last mission to repair Hubble telescope
By DPA,
Washington : For nearly 20 years the Hubble Space Telescope has kept its orbiting eye trained on the universe, and with the launch of space shuttle Atlantis to repair the ageing instrument, scientists hope it will continue to provide important discoveries.
The fifth and last mission to repair Hubble is to launch at 1801 GMT Monday from the Kennedy Space Centre in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Atlantis crew will undertake five spacewalks, adding two new instruments, repairing two others and replacing other hardware in frequently delicate operations.
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.
Kerala must go for modern farm technology: Chandy
By IANS,
Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala should embrace modern technology in agriculture, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said Saturday.
Want to meet T-Rex? Go to Jharkhand
By IANS,
Ranchi : Want to know more about the ferocious T-Rex and his friends? Well, there's good news for you, as the forest department of Jharkhand plans to establish a dinosaur park in the state.
The authorities came up with the idea after footprints resembling those of the big reptiles were discovered in the state.
"Footprints resembling those of dinosaurs have been found in Pithoria in Ranchi and Hazaribagh districts. There is a possibility that the big reptiles might have been roaming in these areas," said Nitish Priyadarshi, a geologist and environmentalist.
Astronomers discover new planet in constellation Leo
By Xinhua
London : British and Spanish scientists have discovered a possible terrestrial-type planet orbiting a star in the constellation of Leo, science news weibsite Alpha Galileo reported on Wednesday.
A team of astronomers from the Spanish Research Council (CSIC) working with Jean-Philippe Beaulieu, a visiting astrophysicist at University College London (UCL), made the discovery from model predictions of a new exoplanet (extrasolar planet) orbiting a star in the constellation of Leo.
German scientists readying Indian Ocean tsunami warning system
By DPA
Hamburg : Scientists in Germany are putting the finishing touches on an Indian Ocean tsunami early-warning system.
The German-Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System for the Indian Ocean (GITEWS) is on schedule, according to project coordinator Joern Lauterjung of the GeoForschungsZentrum Potsdam (GFZ), Germany's National Lab for Geosciences.
DoT for subscriber-based spectrum allocation, operators clash
By IANS
New Delhi : Notwithstanding the strong protest of GSM operators, the Department of Telecommunications (DoT) has accepted its technical arm's proposal to allocate the scarce radio waves to all operators based on the number of subscribers.
The technical wing of DoT, Telecom Engineering Centre (TEC), in its report to DoT, has suggested that the subscriber-linked criteria for fresh spectrum allocation be raised by anywhere in between 2-15 times depending on the network.
NASA, Europeans plan new missions to Jupiter, Saturn
By Xinhua,
Washington : The US space agency NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA) would conduct missions to Jupiter, Saturn and many moons that circle the planets, the agencies announced.
The missions include sending multiple spacecraft to the Jupiter and Saturn systems to explore the planets and their unique satellites, such as Jupiter's ice-covered Europa and Saturn's shrouded moon Titan.
Insat-4CR launch delayed by 50 minutes
By IANS
Sriharikota : The launch of India's latest communication satellite Insat-4CR was put on hold for 50 minutes Sunday evening due to a technical hitch 15 seconds before the scheduled blast-off time.
The satellite was to be launched at 4.21 p.m by the geo-synchronous satellite launch vehicle (GSLV-F04).
Some of the parameters pertaining to the launch vehicle were reportedly not on the expected lines.
Online tool in battle against global poverty
By TwoCircles.net news desk
New York: The United Nations has teamed up with technology leaders Google and Cisco to launch a new online site to track global progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – the set of ambitious targets the world has set itself for slashing poverty, hunger, disease, illiteracy and other social ills by 2015.
MDG Monitor is a web application that tracks real-time progress toward the Goals in a number of categories in nearly every country in the world.
500-year-old statues found in Peru
By EFE,
Lima : Peruvian archaeologists have found 12 wooden statues more than 500 years old in the archaeological complex of Chan Chan.
Cristobal Campana, director of one of the teams working at Chan Chan, told EFE Tuesday that the statues were discovered at the entrance to the �an An palace, the most modern building on the site.
Chan Chan, located near the southern city of Trujillo, was the capital of the Chimu kingdom, and had in its period of maximum splendour as many as 60,000 inhabitants in an area of 1,400 hectares.
Soya shake may help reduce fat in postmenopausal women
By IANS
New York : A study by US scientists suggests that a soya based drink a day may help postmenopausal women to reduce fat, particularly the fat that accumulates on the stomach.
Abdominal fat is particularly bad for health. It raises the risk of heart attacks and diabetes. Soya may also help women cut risk of cardiovascular disease or diabetes, the study suggests.
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.
US scientists develop substance to absorb carbon dioxide
By Xinhua
Los Angeles : US researchers have developed a substance that can absorb carbon dioxide from smokestacks and tailpipes.
Researchers at the University of California in Los Angeles (UCLA) developed the gas sucker by synthesising a new class of sponge-like crystals that can soak up carbon dioxide, the primary greenhouse gas in industrial emissions, said the study published in the journal Science Friday.
Mapping a tiny but ruthless killer
By IANS,
London : Don't go by its size. The Etruscan shrew, one of tiniest known mammals that weighs just two grams, ranks among the quickest, most ruthless and adaptive predators.
It overcomes starvation by feeding twice its weight of crickets, cockroaches and spiders daily, preys that are nearly its size. Hence the attacks have to be quick as a flash.
“The Etruscan shrews trust in their sense of touch and the tactile shape recognition to an extent we do not know from other animal species,” said Michael Brecht of Bernstein Centre in Berlin.
ISRO short of 230 scientists
By IANS,
New Delhi : The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is short of 230 scientists and engineers, the Lok Sabha was told Wednesday.
Scientists use bacteria to find oil, natural gas
By IANS,
Bangalore : Vengannapalli, a nondescript village in Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh, may be sitting on a reservoir of gas or oil, say scientists who have been able to make the discovery with the help of soil bacteria that live exclusively on a diet of hydrocarbons like methane, ethane and propane.
A high concentration of these bacteria is an indication that gaseous hydrocarbons are seeping out to the surface from oil or gas reservoirs below the ground, says Anurodh Dayal, a scientist at the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI) in Hyderabad.
India on the moon, with tricolour
By Fakir Balaji, IANS,
Bangalore : India Friday became the fourth country in the world to land a man-made object on the lunar surface when its moon impact probe (MIP), with the tricolour painted on it, landed on the earth's only natural satellite at 8.31 p.m. after ejecting from the Chandrayaan-I spacecraft.
The MIP impacted on the moon's surface 25 minutes after it was separated from Chandrayaan at 8.06 p.m., orbiting at 100 km above.
Russia shortlists 11 for Mars mission simulation
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Russia's Institute of Medical and Biological Problems has shortlisted 11 volunteers to take part in a 520-day simulation of an expedition to Mars, a spokesman said.
The 11 candidates will complete basic spaceflight training and in spring, six of them will be chosen to take part in the experiment, which will simulate all aspects of a journey to the red planet, with a 250-day outward trip, a 30-day stay on its surface, and a 240-day return flight.
India, Russia in talks on moon exploration
By IANS,
New Delhi : India and Russia are cooperating vis-a-vis the Chandrayaan-2 satellite for joint moon cooperation.
Microsoft buys European shopping site for $486 mn
By DPA,
San Francisco : Hoping to boost its Internet power, Microsoft has bought Greenfield Online Inc, the owner of European price comparison site Ciao GmbH, for about $486 million, the company said in a statement.
The price of $17.50 a share represented a 1.4 percent premium over the previous closing price, but was 32 percent more than Greenfield was worth when it withdrew from a deal with Quadrangle Group LLC for $15.50 a share two weeks ago.
Andaman to get biomass power plant: Javadekar
New Delhi : Environment, Forests and Climate Change Minister Prakash Javadekar announced on Wednesday that his ministry has allotted Rs. 5 crore for a...
NASA returns to the moon on India’s Chandrayaan-1
By Arun Kumar, IANS,
Washington : The American space agency NASA is sending two instruments to map the lunar surface on India's maiden moon voyage on its robotic Chandrayaan-1 mission Wednesday.
The Moon Mineralogy Mapper will assess mineral resources, and the Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar, or Mini-SAR, will map the polar regions and look for ice deposits, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA.
Hackers playing havoc with e-mail accounts
New Delhi, Aug 1 (IANS) Mahendra Ved, a senior journalist here, was stunned after receiving a call from his Bahrain-based daughter a few days ago, sounding distressed and enquiring after his whereabouts and well-being.
"She was crying and desperately wanted to reach me after reading an e-mail, which was sent to her by someone who had hacked my gmail account and forwarded a troubling message to all my friends and relatives," Ved says.
"Since Sunday, I have received at least 60 such calls," adds Ved.
India to log 236 mn mobile internet users by 2016: Report
New Delhi: India is projected to have 236 million mobile internet users by 2016, with the figure reaching 314 million by 2017, a report...
CDC eyes India acquisitions to propel growth
By IANS
Bangalore : CDC Software, a wholly owned subsidiary of CDC Corp and a provider of industry-specific enterprise software applications and business services, plans strategic acquisitions in India to expand its presence and scale up its client base, a senior company official said here Wednesday.
SMS hotline for Free TB support service in India
By Bobby Ramakant,
A Short-Message-Service (SMS) hotline was launched in New Delhi, India to provide round-the-clock free tuberculosis (TB) support service to TB patients. This SMS helpline is being managed by ex-TB patients.
Indian tricolour on destination moon
By Fakir Balaji, IANS,
Bangalore : India's maiden moon probe crashed on to the lunar surface at 8.31 p.m. Friday, sending a wealth of data to its mother spacecraft Chandrayaan-1 during the 25 minutes of its useful life. India became the fourth country to send a probe to the moon.
The moon impact probe (MIP), which has the Indian tricolour painted on its four sides, will remain for all time to come on the Shackleton Crater region of the lunar south pole. It will never corrode due to the lack of atmosphere on the moon.
‘Long distance flights with stopovers more eco-efficient’
By IANS,
New Delhi : Long distance flights with stopovers are more efficient, an expert in the field says, pointing out that a Delhi-New York flight with a stopover in Europe can save nine tonnes of fuel and reduce carbon dioxide emissions by a staggering 28 percent against a non-stop flight between the two destinations.
Space shuttle Atlantis docks at ISS
By IANS,
Washington : US space shuttle Atlantis has docked at the International Space Station (ISS) Wednesday after nearly two days of journey.
Commander Charles Hobaugh steered the shuttle to a docking with the station at 1651 GMT, Xinhua reported quoting US space agency NASA.
Before the docking, Hobaugh maneuvered Atlantis through a backflip rotation to expose the heat shield to station flight engineers and photographers Jeffrey Williams and Nicole Stott.
14 cities around Delhi are quake prone
By IANS
New Delhi : The national capital and 14 cities around it, from Alwar in Rajasthan to Meerut in Uttar Pradesh, are highly quake prone, the ministry of earth sciences said Monday.
The 15 cities - Delhi, Gurgaon, Faridabad, Ghaziabad, Meerut, Hapur, Panipat, Rohtak, Palwal, Bulandsehar, Khurja, Alwar, Bahadurgarh, Kundali and Rewari - fall under seismic zone 4.
Seismic zone 4 is considered to be highly prone to earthquakes.
IIT-Kgp, Britain’s WMG join hands to promote ‘Make in India’
Kharagpur : The Indian Institute of Technology-Kharagpur (IIT-Kgp) will start a collaborative programme with Britain-based Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG) to promote the 'Make...
Endeavour astronauts prepare for Sunday landing
By DPA,
Washington : The seven astronauts on space shuttle Endeavour were to complete their mission to the International Space Station (ISS) with landing scheduled at NASA's Kennedy Space Centre in Florida Sunday.
The shuttle undocked from the ISS at 9.47 a.m. (1447 GMT) Friday, and was expected to land at the Kennedy Space Centre at 1.19 p.m. (1819 GMT Sunday.
On Saturday, US space agency NASA was closely monitoring a cold front, which might bring rain, thunderstorms and cross-winds, and could affect Sunday's entry and landing at the Kennedy Space Centre.
Vietnam to launch first telecom satellite next month
By RIA Novosti
Hanoi : Vietnam's first communications satellite, the Vinasat-1, is to be launched on April 12, a Vietnamese government official said on Wednesday.
Nguyen Ba Thuoc, deputy director of the Vietnamese Post and Telecommunications Corporation, the satellite project's investor, said the satellite would be launched by an Ariane carrier rocket by the French company Ariane Space from the Kourou space center in French Guiana.
Soap that cleans clothes with less water
By IANS
Melbourne : Wasting water to rinse that extra lather from your clothes may be a thing of the past now. Scientists in Australia have developed a detergent that cleans clothes with less water.
Normal detergents contain surfactant molecules, which are oil-friendly at one end to capture dirt and water-friendly at the other to pull it away. They also tend to form bubbles, which require extra water to rinse.
Mobile internet access booms in New Zealand
By IANS,
Wellington: More than half of New Zealanders are now accessing the internet through their mobile phones, the government statistics agency announced Friday.
NASA delays flight of Endeavor to avoid space jam
By IANS,
Washington : NASA has postponed the launch of its Endeavor space shuttle by 10 days after a scheduling conflict with Russia's Progress space freighter.
ISRO to launch more satellites this year
By Venkatachari Jagannathan, IANS,
Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh) : After successfully placing five satellites in orbit Monday, India's space agency ISRO said it will launch more satellites this year and efforts were on to put two Indians in space orbit.
"We will launch GSat-5, a communication satellite, using GSLV (Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle) rocket. The other launch will be Resourscesat-2, a remote sensing satellite, using the rocket PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle)," Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman K. Radhakrishnan said here.
US scientist’s flip-flop on Chandrayaan
By IANS,
Panaji : Three days after the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) admitted the abrupt end of its Chandrayaan-1 mission, a leading US-based scientist associated with the project Wednesday termed it "a complete success", but added that "what we have not achieved is our ultimate goal, which was a much more extended mission that was to be achieved during the full two years".
Science with cartoons: Lucknow scientist invited to Europe meet
By IANS,
Lucknow : A Lucknow-based scientist, who uses cartoons to make complex scientific works easy to understand, has been invited to participate in a European science festival in Spain.
At the festival organised by the European Science Events Association (EUSCEA), P.K. Srivastava, a senior scientist with the chemical toxicology division of the Central Drugs Research Institute (CDRI), will make a presentation on 'sceintoons' invented by him in 1988.
New addition to solar system may be bigger than Jupiter
By IANS,
London : A new planet in our solar system's outer reaches could be four times as large as Jupiter, the biggest planet in the system, scientists believe.
‘Chandrayaan could spark lunar land grab’
By IANS,
London : India's lunar mission could spark off a land grab on the moon, a British paper speculated Tuesday.
The Chandrayaan satellite signals the “possibility of a race for mineral wealth on the lunar surface”, particularly helium-3, The Guardian newspaper reported.
While planet Earth was believed to have only 15 tonnes of helium-3, moon is thought to contain up to five million tonnes.
Spacewalk on course for October
By Xinhua
Beijing : China is planning to conduct its first spacewalk in October from a Shenzhou VII spacecraft, senior space engineers said Wednesday.
They also said a research team had been set up to conduct a feasibility study for a space station.
Wang Yongzhi, former chief designer of China's Manned Space Program, said the launch date had originally been scheduled for after the Olympics (Aug 8 to 24) and Paralympics (Sept 6 to 17).
Wang Yongzhi, former chief designer of China's Manned Space Program, said the launch date had originally been scheduled for after the Olympics (Aug 8 to 24) and Paralympics (Sept 6 to 17).
NASA postpones Discovery shuttle launch until May 25
By RIA Novosti
Washington : NASA has postponed the Discovery shuttle launch until May 25 to finalize the preparation of the external fuel tank and due to unfavorable launch conditions before that date, the space agency said on its website.
During Discovery's S-124 mission to the International Space Station (ISS), originally scheduled to launch on April 24, the shuttle and its seven-member crew will deliver the pressurized module and the robotic arm of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Kibo laboratory.
Virtual orchestra software coming soon
By DPA
Munich : Coming soon to a computer near you is a software that allows you to conduct a virtual orchestra by waving a stick, just like a professional conductor.
The gestures can be correctly interpreted as telling the playback device to go faster or slower, forte or piano. A team of developers in Munich, Germany devised the system, which has yet to be commercialised.
The software detects the gestures in three dimensions and transmits them from the sensor, using Bluetooth, to the computer that is 'playing' the virtual orchestral instruments.
Skin cells can change into stem cells
By DPA
Washington : California scientists have reprogrammed human skin cells to be identical to embryonic stem cells, confirming the work of US and Japanese researchers reported late last year.
The findings were published online by the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of the Sciences Monday.
Stem cells hold the promise of curing disease because they can become any type of cell, but the research has caused controversy since until recently the only way to harvest such cells was through destruction of a human embryo.
Team led by Indian compiles online protein encyclopaedia
By Killugudi Jayaraman, IANS
Bangalore : An international team led by an Indian biologist has pioneered an online encyclopaedia of human proteins that will help accelerate biomedical research and drug discovery.
The February 2008 issue of the prestigious journal Nature Biotechnology describes how the scientists' creation, dubbed "Human Proteinpedia", would help biologists around the globe by serving as a community portal for sharing and integration of human protein data.
Kepler camera launched: Other “earths”, where are you?
By DPA,
Washington : NASA late Friday sent the Kepler satellite into Earth's orbit with instructions to search for extraterrestrial life on Earth-type planets orbiting other stars.
The launch from Cape Canaveral in Florida on board a Delta-II-rocket was reported on a live blog operated by the Kepler project on the internet.
The Kepler mission, named after the 17th century German astronomer, is targetting about 100,000 stars in the Milky Way galaxy that scientists believe could have planets orbiting in a "habitable" zone.
‘Current tests for recycled water not adequate’
By IANS,
Sydney : Recycled water may not be safe for drinking, warn researchers who say such water is usually tested for only one kind of pathogen.
Flavia Huygens of the Queensland University of Technology in Australia is part of a team spear-heading a new and innovative water-testing technique that will check for all kinds of pathogens - in hours rather than days.
“Pathogens can be bacterial, viral or parasitic micro-organisms like cryptosporidium and giardia which can make people sick if enough is ingested,” Huygens said.
Indian rocket puts 10 satellites in orbit at one go
By Venkatachari Jagannathan, IANS,
Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh) : India Monday significantly boosted its space capabilities with the copybook launch of a Rs.700 million ($17.4 million) rocket that simultaneously placed in orbit 10 satellites - two Indian and eight foreign.
The launch firmly established India as a major player in the $1 billion global satellite launch market, a significant milestone in the country's 45-year-old space programme.
NASA sets date for space shuttle’s final mission to Hubble
By Xinhua,
Washington : The U.S. space shuttle's final service call to the Hubble Space Telescope is now set for Oct. 8, NASA announced Thursday.
Shuttle Atlantis' STS-125 mission to Hubble was moved from Aug.28 to Oct. 8, due to a delay in deliveries of shuttle components, including the external fuel tanks, said NASA in a statement.
NASA said it also need more time to prepare shuttle Endeavour for a possible rescue mission approximately two weeks after STS-125 launches.
Venezuela uses Vietnamese method to boost rice harvest
By EFE,
Caracas : Venezuela has began a project to grow rice using Vietnamese technology, a method that replaces chemical fertilisers with fish in water channels between the rice plots.
Officials hope the crop yields would increase by as much as 30 percent after using the method.
In a national broadcast, President Hugo Chavez Wednesday praised the "great advances" in agriculture achieved by the Vietnamese, whom he called a "fighting people".
The pilot project will be carried out in a 65,000-hectare area in Apure state.
China aims to launch first lunar probe this year
By Xinhua
Beijing : China was "losing no time" in preparing its first lunar orbiter, Chang'e I, which will most likely be launched in the second half of 2007, a space official said here Sunday.
Webcast: the next-gen communication tool
Mumbai : In an effort to cash in on India's growing Internet broadband applications sector, Citigroup-owned broadband service provider YOU Telecom has launched "webcast" or Internet broadcast, an effective, viewer and user-friendly "one-to-one" communication tool.
"Webcasting as a communication tool is common in developed countries but in India it is still at a nascent stage," said YOU Telecom CEO E.V.S. Chakravarthy here.
Ants offer clues to improve traffic flow, say experts
By DPA,
Hamburg : Ever wonder how hundreds of ants are able to go up and down a narrow twig without bumping into each other? A team of German scientists wants to find out how ants avoid collisions so that they can use the same principle for traffic control.
The scientists built an ingenious super "ant farm" complete with roads, and bridges and a veritable city of ants. Then they observed the traffic patterns of the ants and fed their findings in to a computer.
‘Indian software industry will hold out against competition’
By James Jose, IANS,
New Delhi : The $60-billion information technology industry in India will continue to attract overseas business, despite competition from other emerging markets that also offer lower costs, says the India head of global software giant Computer Associates.
"Our costs will still be competitive. There are markets like China, Singapore, and the Philippines which offer lower costs. But they are not in the same league as India," said the software gian't India chairman Saurabh Srivastava.
China to launch 15 to 16 satellites in 2009: Official
By Xinhua,
Beijing : China plans to launch 15 to 16 satellites this year, an official said here Monday.
"Though the global financial crisis is taking a toll on the world economy, it has no impact on China's space programmes," said Zhang Jianqi, deputy chief commander of the manned space project.
Zhang said China is at present "batch-producing" three spacecraft - Shenzhou-8, Shenzhou-9 and Shenzhou-10.
Indian nano-tech group in US to create big splash
New York(IANS) : A group of Indian Americans well placed in the nano-technology industry have formed The Indus Nanotechnology Association (TINA) to create a bigger impact in the market, estimated to be worth $1 trillion (Rs.39.25 trillion) by 2015.
TINA arose from the Nanotechnology and Nano-Bio Convergence Conference held here last week, where seven of the 14 featured speakers were Indian Americans in academics, research, government and industry.
Astronauts make risky spacewalk to repair broken solar wing
By KUNA
Washington : US Astronauts made risky spacewalk outside the international space station on Wednesday to replace a broken motor needed to tilt a solar wing, clearing a major obstacle to the new module outpost.
During their seven-hour spacewalk Wednesday, Commander Peggy Whitson and fellow NASA astronaut Daniel Tani successfully replaced the broken motor at the base of one of the station's solar wings, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration said on its website. It's unclear why the first motor failed.
Why does natural selection favour only few species?
By IANS,
Washington : Why does natural selection favour few plants and animals species to the exclusion of others?
The answer lies in the rate of metabolism of a species - how fast a species consumes energy, per unit of mass and per unit time, according to a University of California (UC) Riverside-led research team.
The researchers studied 3,006 species, the largest ever analysed by a single team. The list encompasses much of the biological diversity on the planet -- from bacteria to elephants, and algae to sapling trees.
Google unveils social search function
By DPA,
Hamburg : Google is testing a new social search function to make it easier for people find their friends' blogs and twitter feeds.
The only catch is that users of the service need to have an open profile with Google that includes personal contact data.
Once those conditions are met, the user can access the service at the Google Labs. Typing in "New York" will yield a list of friends in the user's social network who have posted items from the Big Apple. Settings can be altered so that only postings from close friends and acquaintances are included in the "social graph."
10-fold increase needed in network to track carbon emissions
BY IANS,
Washington : Monitoring greenhouse gas levels will require a global data collection network 10 times larger than the current set-up, according to a study.
Scientists propose increasing the number of measurement sites from 100 to 1,000, which would decrease the uncertainty in computer models and help scientists better quantify changes.
The study's authors, Melinda Marquis and Pieter Tans, said the need for improved monitoring was imperative in view of atmospheric carbon concentrations now at 385 parts per million, ScienceDaily reported.
Asteriod caused giant hole on Jupiter
By IANS,
London : A huge rock, some 500 metres long, hit Jupiter and created a hole the size of the Pacific Ocean, roughly the equivalent of Jupiter's Little Red Spot, scientists say.
Post-1947 no science Nobel for India: Sibal
By IANS
New Delhi : India has not received a single Nobel Prize in the field of science after independence but efforts are on to spur innovation and research, Minister of Science and Technology Kapil Sibal said Monday.
To a question in the Rajya Sabha on whether it is fact that no Nobel Prize has been awarded to India in science after independence, Sibal said: "Yes Sir".
However, Sibal said his ministry was making efforts to strengthen research and innovation in the field of science.
Computer programme to predict premature births under development
By IANS,
Sydney : Universities of Melbourne and Newcastle are jointly developing a computer programme to predict premature births.
About 17,000 premature births occur in Australia each year. It accounts for 70 percent of deaths among newborns and 50 percent cerebral palsy cases.
Roger Smith, professor, University of Newcastle, said identifying patterns in hormone levels could be the key to determining high risk pregnancies.
Scientists mine Twitter to discover drug side-effects
Washington: Using Twitter data, scientists have invented a new technique for discovering potentially dangerous drug interactions and unknown side-effects.
The results can help build a...
NEC launches world’s fastest supercomputer
By DPA
Tokyo : NEC Corporation of Japan said Thursday it has launched the world's fastest vector-type supercomputer.
The new SX-9 model is equipped with a central processing unit core that can process information at a maximum speed of 102.4 gigaflops. One gigaflop is equivalent to one billion floating point operations per second.
When connected with up to 512 units, one unit of the SX-9, which can be equipped with up to 16 CPUs, can perform information processing at 839 teraflops. One teraflop represents one trillion floating point operations per second.
Medieval stained glass windows acted like nano air purifiers
By IANS,
Sydney : Stained glass windows in churches dotting Europe and painted with gold purified the air when lit up by sunlight, according to Queensland University of Technology experts.
"For centuries, people appreciated only the beautiful works of art, and long life of the colours, but little did they realise that these works... are also... photocatalytic air purifier with nanostructured gold catalyst," said Zhu Huai Yong, of Queensland's School of Physical and Chemical Sciences.
Arctic region needs major cleaning, says Putin
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : The Arctic region, a strategic area for Russia, is heavily polluted and needs "major cleaning", Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Thursday.
Putin visited Alexandra Land, one of the islands in Russia's far north, and found that over 40,000-60,000 tonnes of used lubricants in thousands of barrels as well as plane, car and other wreckage had been piled up in the Arctic for years.
"The reduction of military cooperation after the collapse of the Soviet Union resulted in this scrap heap," the premier said.
Recreating planetary sounds from Mars, Venus
By IANS,
London : Scientists have for the first time recreated the sound of lightning and whirlwinds from Mars and Venus and also how we would hear human voices on their surface.
‘Creating diverse workforce greatest challenge for global firms’
By IANS,
Bangalore : Creation of diverse workforce would be the greatest challenge for corporations in a globalised world, Infosys Technologies chairman and chief mentor N.R. Narayana Murthy said here Saturday.
"As corporations grow and globalise, I am convinced that the greatest challenge they will face will be the creation of a diverse workforce," Murthy told shareholders at the company's 27th annual general meeting (AGM) for fiscal 2008.
Phoenix Mars Lander releases its robotic arm
By DPA,
Washington : The Phoenix Mars Lander has released its robotic arm to begin prodding the red planet's surface to look for chemistry that could support life, NASA officials said Thursday.
NASA officials hope the robotic arm can poke into the surface to substantiate evidence of ice or water in the northernmost areas of Mars that could have supported life. Chemical compositions can be analyzed aboard the craft and the results beamed back to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
US space shuttle Endeavour lifts off
By Xinhua
Washington : US space shuttle Endeavour lifted off early Tuesday from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, NASA TV reported.
"All systems are working well ... Endeavour is making its way to the International Space Station (ISS)," NASA's launch blog said after the shuttle jettisoned its twin solid rocket boosters and shut down its three main engines as planned.
The Endeavour and its seven-member crew will spend 16 days in space, the longest visit by the space shuttle to the ISS.
Wipro develops software for police to combat crime, terror
By IANS,
Bangalore : Wipro Infotech has developed an integrated software for the police to combat crime and terror, the IT bellwether announced here Friday.
“The software application, which is in a pilot stage, will help the police and other law enforcement agencies to combat the fast emerging hi-tech world of crime and terror,” the company said in a statement.
AMD sets up silicon design facility in India
By IANS
Bangalore : Leading chipmaker Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) Inc Thursday expanded its research and development (R&D) operations in India by opening a silicon design facility in the country's IT hub.
AMD chairman and CEO Hector Ruiz, who inaugurated the new facility, told reporters that its Indian subsidiary plays a critical role in the company's global design network, including development of its most advanced, next-generation processing solutions.
Life-changing innovations vie for top global tech honour
By Jaideep Sarin, IANS,
Helsinki (Finland) : Few would know that it is an algorithm that helps us use the mobile phone technology that has made our lives simpler. Or that an optic fibre cable that couldn't send a communication one metre across is now a basis for the global information super highway of over 10,000 km.
These are just two of the four top innovations developed by six scientists and inventors in the last few years, which are in the fray for this year's Millennium Technology Prize - the highest prize in the world of technology and considered Nobel Prize in this area.
Bolivia to produce electric-car batteries
By EFE,
La Paz : Bolivia is planning to begin the production of lithium batteries for electric cars by 2018, Deputy Minister of Science and Technology Roger Carvajal said here, according to a report.
Carvajal said that President Evo Morales' government has settled on a basic strategy for exploiting the vast lithium deposits in the Uyuni Salt Flats.
He discussed the plan on the eve of an international forum in La Paz on the industrialisation of lithium, the report added Wednesday.
World misled over glacier meltdown: Report
By IRNA,
New Delhi : A warning that most of the Himalayan glaciers will melt by 2035 owing to climate change is likely to be retracted after the United Nations body that issued it admitted to a series of scientific blunders.
Two years ago, the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) headed by India's Rajendra Pachauri, issued a benchmark report that claimed to have incorporated the latest and most detailed research into the impact of global warming.
A central claim was that world's glaciers were melting so fast that those in the Himalayas could vanish by 2035.
Rise of Google Chrome threatens Internet Explorer, Mozilla
By IANS,
London : Web browser Google Chrome, which emerged in mid-2008, has hit Internet Explorer hard and stalled the rise of Mozilla Firefox.
Google opens store for Chrome users
By DPA,
Mountain View (US) : Google has started up a portal for downloading extensions and web applications to its Chrome internet browser.
Space industry part of efforts to achieve vision 2020 – Malaysian PM
By NNN-Bernama
Ipoh (Malaysia) : The country's involvement in space industry is part of broader efforts to attain the Vision 2020 objective of turning Malaysia into a developed country, said Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi.
He said to bring about progress, the government had to implement various initiatives, one of which was Malaysia's foray into space science.