India discovers 67 animal species, 29 plant species
By Prashant K. Nanda, IANS,
New Delhi : Indian scientists have discovered 67 new animal species, including fishes, spiders and crop eating insects, and 29 plant species, including grass and flower varieties, last year.
"All these discoveries were made in 2007 and they are vital additions to the plant and animal science of India and the world," Ramakrishna, director of Zoological Survey of India (ZSI), told IANS Thursday.
Space shuttle Endeavour to launch on March 11
By Xinhua
Beijing : NASA confirmed the U.S. space shuttle Endeavour will launch on March 11 for a 16-day mission, according to media reports Sunday.
The NASA mission management on Friday confirmed the official launch time of the Endeavour. On March 11 at 2:28 a.m. EDT, the space shuttle will be launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
It will be the first of three flights to deliver a huge Japanese research complex to the International Space Station.
Beijing : NASA confirmed the U.S. space shuttle Endeavour will launch on March 11 for a 16-day mission, according to media reports Sunday.
The NASA mission management on Friday confirmed the official launch time of the Endeavour. On March 11 at 2:28 a.m. EDT, the space shuttle will be launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
It will be the first of three flights to deliver a huge Japanese research complex to the International Space Station.
‘Sunshield’ to protect space telescope from extremes of heat, cold
By IANS,
Washington : Engineers have designed a 'Sunshield' to protect NASA's James Webb space telescope from extremes of heat and cold, radiation and small debris.
Besides, the 'Sunshield' would also block solar heat to allow its cameras and instruments to operate optimally at 1.6 million km from the earth in 2013.
A satellite has to withstand the icy cold and the intense heat and radiation of a solar flare in space, which ranges between a super-hot 127 degrees Celsius and a frigid minus 243.
Cell phone batteries that won’t overheat
By IANS
London : Remember the scare last year caused by some Nokia batteries that were found to be overheating while charging -- leading to their worldwide recall?
Such scares will soon be a thing of the past.
German researchers have developed a safer lithium-ion battery that is virtually non-inflammable, addressing concerns of mobile phones users worldwide.
The new prototype is based on a polymer electrolyte, which unlike liquid electrolyte in conventional cell phone batteries is not inflammable.
With new iPhone, download photo sharing application too
By Fakir Balaji, IANS,
Bangalore : As excitement heightens for the launch of Apple's iPhone in India Friday, two Indian techies from the US have pitched in to offer a free download of their mobile application on iPhone for photo sharing, with value added features to boot.
The entrepreneurial techies - Apoorva Ruparel and Keshav Murthy - are part of the team that established AirMe Inc at Colorado Springs a year ago to design, develop and offer AirMe on the Apple applications store for iPhone users.
India is top spam sender in Asia: study
By IANS,
New Delhi : India is the top spam sender in Asia and the seventh largest in the world, accounting for over four percent of the total global spam, says a study.
"India is the leader among Asian countries in spam, accounting for more than four percent of the total global spam and is ahead of other Asian countries such as China (3.39 percent), Republic of Korea (2.57 percent) and Thailand (2.04 percent)," says Trend Micro, a firm that provides Internet content security, focusing on securing the exchange of digital information for businesses and consumers.
Chinese astronauts test suit for spacewalk mission
By Xinhua,
Beijing : Astronauts aboard China's Shenzhou VII spacecraft Friday finished assembling a spacesuit for tests before carrying out the country's first spacewalk mission.
Two of the three astronauts unpacked the Chinese-made suit inside the orbital module of the spacecraft as the third astronaut waited in the re-entry module.
The spacewalk, or extra-vehicular activity (EVA), slated for 4.30 p.m. Saturday will last about 30 minutes, Wang Zhaoyao, spokesperson of the manned space programme said Friday.
Endeavour poised for rare nighttime launch
By Xinhua
Beijing : Space shuttle Endeavour was poised for a rare nighttime liftoff Tuesday from the Kennedy Space Center to the international space station, U.S. media reported.
Technicians at the center began fueling the shuttle late Monday afternoon with more than 500,000 gallons (1.9 million liters) of supercold liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen for the 2:28 a.m. EDT blast off as there were no major problems reported.
It will be the first shuttle launch in darkness since 2006. Only a quarter of all shuttles have been launched at nighttime.
New experimental HIV vaccine shows promise
New York : A vaccine regimen that first primes the immune system and then boosts it to increase the response could ultimately prove...
Dell launches ultra-thin laptop computer
By Xinhua,
San Francisco : Dell has officially launched a high-end laptop computer which the company said is the thinnest in the world.
The laptop is the first product under Dell's Adamo brand. Adamo is derived from the Latin word meaning "to fall in love".
With a thickness of 0.65 inches (1.65 cm) and available in onyx and pearl colours, the new Adamo laptop is thinner than Apple's MacBook Air.
Intel unveils most powerful chip designed in India
By IANS,
Bangalore : The world's largest chip maker Intel Corp Tuesday unveiled its most powerful six core microprocessor designed and developed at its India development centre in this information technology (IT) hub.
The 45-nanometre chip boasts of a whopping 1.9 billion transistors, six processing cores and 16MB of shared cache memory in the Xeon family.
Data instead of paper and ink: E-books growing in popularity
By Janne Terfruechte, DPA,
Frankfurt : Relaxing on the couch and browsing through a weighty tome - for many, that sounds like paradise. Trying to drag that book along in your pocket is however less fun. An alternative to this is the e-books that until now have enjoyed a niche existence. That might be about to change.
Martian surface hints at groundwater torrents
By Xinhua
Beijing : Scientists said surface features of the Red Planet hint at a watery past where torrents of groundwater carved out deep canyons, formed sweeping fans of sediment and cemented together huge fault lines, media reported Tuesday.
"Groundwater probably played a major role in shaping many of the things we see on the Martian surface," said George Postma, a sedimentologist at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.
Beijing : Scientists said surface features of the Red Planet hint at a watery past where torrents of groundwater carved out deep canyons, formed sweeping fans of sediment and cemented together huge fault lines, media reported Tuesday.
"Groundwater probably played a major role in shaping many of the things we see on the Martian surface," said George Postma, a sedimentologist at Utrecht University in the Netherlands.
PSLV launch put off due to technical glitch
By IANS,
Bangalore : India has put off the launch of an advanced remote sensing satellite, fixed for May 9, after a technical glitch in its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle was detected, the space agency said here Thursday.
"A marginal drop in the pressure in second stage of the vehicle was noticed during the mandatory checks carried out on the PSLV-C15 vehicle," the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) said in a statement.
Humans first covered their nakedness 170,000 years ago
By IANS,
Washington : A research suggests that humans first covered their nakedness some 170,000 years ago, something which helped them move out of Africa.
NASA postpones Endeavour launch
By IANS,
Washington : US space agency NASA Sunday postponed the launch of its space shuttle Endeavour by at least one day due to a low cloud ceiling over Kennedy Space Centre in Florida.
Launch managers initially plan for a 24-hour turnaround, but will evaluate Monday's weather before making a final decision. Next possible launch attempt is 0914 GMT Monday, Xinhua reported.
Mars to be closest to Earth on March 5
By IANS,
New Delhi : Watch out for Mars shining brightly in the sky around midnight Monday, as the red planet will be closest to the Earth.
‘Jaws of steel’ helped primitive man crack hard nuts, seeds
By IANS,
Washington : Our ancestors, going back 2.5 million years, had jaws of steel with which they cracked open hard nuts and objects, unlike human species today with much more delicate and smaller teeth, a research study has shown.
Mark Spencer, Arizona State University (ASU) assistant professor and evolutionary scientist, and doctoral student Caitlin Schrein used futuristic computer modelling and simulation technology to build a virtual model of the A. africanus skull to see how the jaw operated.
China to use jumbo rocket for delivery of lunar rover, space station
By Xinhua
Beijing : A Chinese space expert said here on Tuesday that the Long March 5 large-thrust carrier rocket, currently under development and scheduled to be put into service in 2014, will be mainly used for the delivery of lunar rovers, large satellites and space stations.
"With a maximum payload capacity up to 25 tons, the jumbo rocket is expected to be able to send lunar rovers, large satellites and space stations into space after 2014," said Liang Xiaohong, vice president of the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology.
Arctic sea ice thins by 19 percent
By IANS,
Washington : Sea ice in large swathes of Arctic thinned by as much as 19 percent last winter, compared to previous five winters, according to data from European Space Agency's Envisat satellite.
Using Envisat radar altimeter data, scientists from the Centre for Polar Observation and Modelling at University College London (UCL) measured sea ice thickness over the Arctic from 2002 to 2008 and found that it had been fairly constant until the record loss of ice in the summer of 2007.
190 mn-year-old dinosaur fossils found in Argentina
By IANS/EFE,
Buenos Aires : A species of dinosaur that lived 190 million years ago has been found in Argentina, a researcher said.
"No discoveries with these characteristics had ever been made in the region. It's an important discovery because it helps us understand the environmental diversity of the period," researcher Santiago Bessone of the Museum Egidio Feruglio, an institution based in the Argentine Patagonian city of Trelew that was responsible for the expedition, told EFE.
Don’t have a laptop? Try the virtual computer!
By Jeevan Mathew Kurian, IANS,
Kozhikode : You have heard of desktops and laptops, but now two engineering students in Kerala have come up with a virtual computer that can be accessed from anywhere in the world. All it needs is an internet connection.
K. Ansar and P.P. Ismail, final year computer science students at an engineering college in Vatakara, about 45 km from here, have set up www.bloxtr.com, the prototype of a virtual computer in which you can store all your important documents, favourite music, colourful pictures and even videos.
Microsoft unveils Windows 7, a fix for disappointing Vista
By DPA,
Los Angeles : Microsoft released key details Tuesday of the next generation of software that it hopes will run the world's computers.
The software giant, whose dominance is under threat, said Windows 7 will replace the disappointing Windows Vista in January 2010.
Microsoft said the new operating system was designed to function like a tighter version of Vista, which launched in 2006 but was widely derided as a "system hog" that slowed down computers with features that most users never accessed.
China did have clearer skies during Olympics: Satellite imagery
By IANS,
Washington : China did have clearer skies and easier breathing when it shut down factories and banished many cars in a pre-Olympic sprint to clean up Beijing's air.
Taking advantage of the opportunity, researchers have since analysed data from NASA's Aura and Terra satellites that show how key pollutants responded to the Olympic restrictions.
New Year’s Eve revelers to be treated to rare ‘blue moon’
By DPA,
New York : Times Square revelers will be treated to a rare "blue moon" on New Year's Eve Thursday night.
Hundreds of thousands of people are expected to watch the ritual descent of the crystal ball in Times Square to usher in 2010 at midnight. But what many of them may not yet expect is a special full moon above their heads, the second this month.
Lenovo launches online auction of Olympic theme PCs
By IANS,
Kolkata : Lenovo, Chinese manufacturer of PCs and partner of the Beijing Olympic torch relay, Saturday launched its second phase of three online auctions in India as part of the countdown to the games.
The auction features notebook PCs inspired by the Olympic torch and is signed by Saif Ali Khan.
Saif was one of the torchbearers who ran in the New Delhi leg of the relay April 17.
Glaciers in southern Alps shrinking at alarming rate
By IANS,
Sydney : Glaciers in the southern Alps have lost 2.2 billion tonnes of permanent ice in a year since April 2007, the fourth highest annual loss since monitoring began.
For the past 32 years, the New Zealand based National Institute of Water & Atmospheric Research (NIWA) has been surveying 50 glaciers in the southern Alps, using a small fixed wing aircraft, to record the height of the snow line at the end of summer
Other universes exist alongside our own
By IANS,
London : Scientists say they have found evidence that our universe was 'jostled' by other parallel universes in the distant past.
Microgrid power stations can ensure uninterrupted supply
By IANS,
Washington : Microgrid based power stations with their own energy source and independent control could ensure uninterrupted power supply even after hurricanes or natural disasters.
Texas University professor Alexis Kwasinski has formulated a new plan to de-centralise power architecture that would have kept the lights and phones on in town and cities in such an eventuality.
India to launch dedicated meteorological satellite
By IANS
New Delhi : India is set to launch an advanced meteorological satellite by the end of this year to boost its weather forecasting capabilities.
The satellite INSAT-3D will give "quantum jump in satellite meteorology", P.S. Goel, secretary of the Ministry of Earth Sciences, said Tuesday.
This satellite is almost similar to GOES Satellites of the US and will have six channel imagers.
Goel spoke about the satellite at the ongoing Saarc (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) Workshop on Weather Forecasting Techniques in the national capital.
Interactive websites shape popular perception: study
By IANS,
Toronto : An attractively designed website, encouraging interaction with a target audience, helps shape popular perceptions about an organisation or the groups it represents.
S. Shyam Sundar of Pennsylvania State University and colleagues are trying to fathom how such interactivity influences public perception of an organisation.
In previous studies of such websites, Sundar had found that candidates were rated more positively if their site had some interactive features, independently of the quality of content.
Kerala firm launches window solar water heater
By IANS
Kochi (Kerala) : Power electronics company Hykon India has introduced a window collector solar water heater, claimed to be the first in the country.
Hykon Window Solar Collectors can be installed on balconies and windows of flats, apartments and individual villas where conventional rooftop water heaters do not fit in.
Amphibian 70 mn years older than dinosaurs found
By IANS,
London : A 300-million-year-old fossil of an amphibian that roamed the planet 70 million years before the dinosaurs has been found, a media report said.
Daily Express reported Tuesday that scientists have found the well preserved five-inch long skull of an invertebrate named Fedexia striegeli, which is one of the earliest amphibian fossil discoveries.
Researchers said that the creature lived more than 70 million years before the first dinosaurs.
Compost can reduce carbon emissions
By IANS
London : Organic fertilisers applied to farmland could trap carbon stored in the soil and cut down on greenhouse emissions.
Carbon sequestration in soil has been recognised as a means to mitigate emissions by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the European Commission.
Twenty percent of farmlands in Eurpoean Union could target about 8.6 percent of its total emissions for reduction, said a research paper published in the journal Waste Management and Research.
Low on self-esteem? Have a ‘parasocial’ relationship
By IANS,
Washington : Admiring celebrities, even from afar, can help people with low self-esteem to see themselves in a more flattering light, according to a new study.
The study, by researchers from the University at Buffalo and State University of New York, illustrates how such “parasocial” relationships can benefit people facing difficulties in interpersonal relationships.
The researchers based their study on 100 undergraduates to examine the relationship between self-esteem, parasocial relationship closeness and self-discrepancies.
NASA’s Phoenix retests release of Martian soil
By Xinhua,
Washington : Engineers and scientists operating NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander decided early Tuesday to repeat a practice test of releasing Martian soil from the scoop on the lander's Robotic Arm.
When the arm collected and released its first scoopful of soil on Sunday, some of the sample stuck to the scoop. The team told Phoenix Tuesday morning to lift another surface sample and release it, with more extensive imaging of the steps in the process.
Software to locate stolen laptops launched
By IANS
Mumbai : Mumbai based Micro technologies have launched India's first laptop tracking system to locate stolen laptops.
Micro Lost Notebook Tracking System (LNTS) is a software product that is embedded on notebook hard drives and is tracked as soon as they are connected to the Internet.
"The software was developed to deter, track and recover stolen laptops, notebooks and personal computers," said P. Shekar, Micro technologies chairperson.
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.
New tool opens up world of cells in greater detail
By IANS
London : A revolutionary new tool not only allows a better, brighter visualisation of two or more proteins but also helps differentiate young and old copies of a protein within the human cell.
Developed by researchers at Ecole Polytechnique in Lausanne, Switzerland, the procedure is the latest in a line of innovative tools relying on fluorescent molecules to view such biochemical processes.
This tool, called SNAP-tag, can be labelled in living cells using benzylguanine (BG) derivatives bearing a chemical probe.
Scientists spot largest molecules in space
By IANS,
London : Scientists in Canada have spotted the largest molecules existing in space called buckyballs.
The roughly spherical molecules consist of a "third type of carbon", after graphite and diamond, which occur widely on earth.
Buckyballs, on the other hand, have only been created in labs and have never before been proven to exist elsewhere, reports The Telegraph.
The BBC reported that a research group used an infrared telescope owned by Nasa to spot the buckyballs in "a cloud of cosmic dust surrounding a distant star".
Scientists can predict if women are going to break their hip
By IANS
New York : Scientists have listed 11 factors that will help doctors predict if a postmenopausal woman is going to suffer hip fractures over a period of five years.
A hip fracture is a common injury for elderly people. A broken hip can lead to more serious problems, even death. For older women, a hip fracture can mean continuing ill health.
Saudi prince buys into Twitter
By IANS,
London: Saudi billionaire prince Alwaleed bin Talal has invested $300 million in the microblogging company Twitter, becoming its latest major investor.
Free software helps Indian techies in many projects
By IANS,
Bangalore : Free software and open source tools are helping a range of Indian entrepreneurs to build software solutions that enhance the potential of computing for millions.
With names like Hindawi, Zmanda and Dhvani or KDE Hindi, these products are helping an entire new generation of software developres.
Hindawi (hindawi.in) is a suite of open source programming languages. It allows people to write computer programmes in languages other than English.
Nehru Planetarium to organise public skywatch
By IANS,
New Delhi : Ever look up and marvel at the beauty of the evening sky? Skygazers in the national capital now have the opportunity of studying celestial bodies as the Nehru Planetarium is organising round the year public skywatches, officials said Monday.
As part of International Year of Astronomy, the Nehru Planetarium will organise skywatching for the public besides series of lectures by noted astrophysicists and scholars in 2009.
Google to introduce new features for “live” election results
New Delhi : Google said Wednesday it will introduce new features to help provide comprehensive latest news and live update of election results scheduled...
India is wasting its time chasing BlackBerry
By Prasanto K. Roy, IANS,
You're a Delhi-based wannabe terrorist needing to communicate with your handlers. What do you do? Invisible-ink notes are passe, as are carrier pigeons. You will, of course, use electronic options.
Like e-mail. Walk into a cyber cafe, log into a G-mail or Yahoo account. Don't use an account in your own name. And don't send e-mail. Simply read instructions left for you in an unsent mail, saved as a draft in your account. Then, to reply, just edit the unsent e-mail, and save it back as a draft. If e-mail isn't travelling, it can't be intercepted.
NASA buys life-like humanoid as tour guide
By IANS,
London : A life-like robot, which speaks more than a dozen languages and has a pawky sense of humour, has been bought by NASA to become a robotic tour guide.
SMS to know CAT answers within hours of exam
By IANS
Mumbai : Months of fretting after taking the Combined Admission Test (CAT) for admissions to top management institutes may become a thing of the past with the launch of an SMS service that will give the answers within hours of taking the exam.
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.
Scientist cautions against genetic testing
By IANS,
Washington : A scientist has warned compatriots against rushing into genetic testing in the hope of making revolutionary improvements.
"Advances being made in genomics are important discoveries, but it's unrealistic for individuals to believe those advances can yield meaningful information that will improve their health," said James P. Evans, of University of North Carolina.
British experts use Gurmukhi to aid forensic research
By Prasun Sonwalkar, IANS
London : In a unique scientific study, British researchers have used the Punjabi script Gurmukhi to help narrow down the identity of writers and develop a technique that could profile criminal authors of documents.
Forensic experts at the University of Derby believe that a Punjabi equivalent of the English pangram 'The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog' could help profile the criminal authors of documents.
Milkweed plant evolves new defences to outwit caterpillars
By IANS,
Washington : Some plants are discarding elaborate defences against predatory caterpillars and evolving more favourable stratagems to ensure survival, according to a study.
The latest example is the milkweed plant, which, according to genetic analysis, instead of resisting predators, is now putting greater efforts into repairing themselves faster than their foe monarch butterfly caterpillar can eat them.
Chandrayaan may explain origins of Moon: British scientist
By IANS,
London : A British scientist who helped design a camera on board India's Chandrayaan-1 says he hopes images from it will help answer two tantalising questions about the Moon.
“Where did the Moon come from? And could it ever sustain human life?” Maneul Grande of Aberystwyth Universtiy told the Times newspaper.
“After the Apollo landings, people thought they knew a fair bit about the Moon - they'd seen people walking around up there,” said Grande, who helped to design the European Space Agency's camera that will take X-ray images of the Moon's surface.
Revamp ‘white elephant’ CSIR, universities: Kasturirangan
By Prashant K. Nanda, IANS
New Delhi : The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and Indian universities have become "white elephants" and need to be revamped to achieve successes in science, says eminent space scientist K. Kasturirangan.
Many of the laboratories in CSIR, the country's biggest scientific body, need a complete overhaul and their mission, organisational set-up and infrastructure need to change for the better, Kasturirangan said in an interview.
Now, ISRO scientists develop hydrogen fuel cells to power bus
By NNN-PTI,
Bangalore, India : India's space scientists have developed hydrogen fuel cells to power an automobile bus by leveraging their know-how of the homegrown cryogenic technology for rockets.
The two-year effort has yielded positive results and the scientists are now readying for the fuel cells to be fitted into a bus.
"That's not exactly the cryogenic technology... (It's) liquid hydrogen handling and that's where we have some expertise. So, we have finalised the design", Chairman of Indian Space Research Organisation, G Madhavan Nair told PTI here.
Internet shapes global Tibet protests
By IANS,
New Delhi : The emergence of social networking sites has come as a boon for cyber-dissidents who use these internet tools not just to create a buzz on the web but also as a platform to organise protests and flash strikes.
On Facebook, there are nearly 15 groups that come up on a word search for 'tibet'. But, the largest by far is that of "Free Tibet", which had a membership count of 88,460. When accessed on Thursday afternoon, it had over 8,700 posts, 1,727 photos, 360 discussions topics and 51 videos.
Microsoft set to unveil Internet Explorer 8
By IANS,
Redmond : After two beta tests and a soft release, Microsoft Corp is all set to officially launch its latest internet browser Thursday night.
The company will launch Internet Explorer 8 (IE8) at 9:30 p.m. Indian time, an official statement said.
Microsoft, whose share in the browser market took a beating with the emergence of rivals like Mozilla's Firefox, Google's Chrome and Apple's Safari, is aiming to regain its lost ground with the new browser.
Microsoft's market share dropped to about 67 percent last month as compared to over 90 percent three years ago.
India launches satellite-based navigation system
By IANS,
New Delhi : India Tuesday launched a satellite-based navigation system to aid air traffic in the region and joined a select club of nations which have similar capabilities.
Civil Aviation Minister Praful Patel launched the Global Position System Aided Geo Augmented Navigation (GAGAN) based on a constellation of 24 satellites positioned in six earth-centred orbital planes.
Google Earth integrates Street View’s 3D maps
By DPA,
Berlin : By combining two services, Google has now made it possible to pick points on the globe, look at them from outer space, and then zoom all the way in for a street-level view.
Astronauts get ready for first spacewalk
By SPA,
Houston : Shuttle Discovery's astronauts geared up for the first spacewalk of their mission Tuesday and the Installation of Japan's giant lab to the international space station.
The two spacecraft linked up Monday, and the 10 space travelers immediately got ready to tackle their first big job.
Discovery's designated spacewalkers, Michael Fossum and Ronald Garan Jr., will prep the US$1 billion (¤640 million) lab, named Kibo _ Japanese for hope _ for installation.
China’s First Manned Space Mission
By SPA
Beijing : China plans to carry out its first spacewalk in second half of the year, an official of the nation's manned space program said here on Thursday, according to Xinhua.
The Shenzhou VII spacecraft will be launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the northwestern province of Gansu latein the year and the astronauts will leave their spacecraft for the first time, the official told Xinhua.
The spacecraft will also release a small inspection satellite, which monitors its own performance.
NASA launches spacecraft to study solar wind
By DPA,
Washington : NASA has launched its Interstellar Boundary Explorer (Ibex) to examine the weakening solar wind, which shields planets in the solar system from dangerous cosmic rays.
Over the next two years, the Ibex spacecraft will conduct extremely high-altitude orbits above Earth to investigate and capture first images of processes taking place at the interstellar boundary - the farthest reaches of the solar system.
Russian spacecraft blasts off to space station
By RIA Novosti
Moscow : A Russian cargo spacecraft, Progress M-62, has lifted off for the International Space Station (ISS) from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan, Russia's mission control said Sunday.
"The spacecraft was launched in the nominal regime at the designated time (10:12 a.m. Moscow time or 07:12 a.m. GMT)," mission control said.
The Progress vehicle's flight to the station will last three days instead of two days to prepare the spacecraft's systems for docking with the ISS more carefully, mission control said.
Intense Technologies bags Iranian telecom software contract
By IANS
Hyderabad : City-based IT company Intense Technologies Wednesday announced it has won a customer communication management project for mobile service provider MTN Irancell of Iran.
MTN Irancell will be using the Intense iECCM (intelligent enterprise customer communication management) framework to substantially reduce its customer communication costs, build its brand image and enhance its customer intimacy levels, said a statement by Intense Technologies here.
Scientists working on vaccine without needle
By IANS
Melbourne : Australian scientists are working to develop vaccine delivery through a small skin patch rather than a needle.
Spiders which eat together, stay together and multiply
By IANS,
Washington : The ability to work together and capture larger prey has allowed social spiders to flourish beyond the strength of their numbers, according to a new study.
The surface area of the three-dimensional webs social spiders use to capture prey does not grow as fast as the number of spiders in the nests. So the number of incoming prey per spider declines with colony size.
Kaiga poisoning: Thousands had access to radioactive chemical
By IANS,
Bangalore : Whoever caused the contamination of a drinking water dispenser at the state-run Kaiga atomic power plant in Karnataka could have been either a permanent or a contract worker, an official said Monday.
This would make it more difficult to nail the man who had added radioactive Tritium to the water, he added. Forty-five employees were affected and had to be hospitalised Nov 24 after drinking water from the dispenser, which was located inside a laboratory.
Twin NASA probes reach lunar orbit
By IANS,
Washington : New Year's Eve and New Year's Day saw twin US spacecraft entering lunar orbit to study the moon, NASA said.
NASA set to give update on long-delayed Atlantis mission
By KUNA
Washington : NASA will hold a meeting Thursday to discuss the status of the shuttle Atlantis and ongoing work to repair a fuel circuitry problem that grounded the mission to the International Space Station (ISS) in early December.
Last week, NASA's space shuttle Atlantis was still no closer to lift off. Officials pushed-back the Atlantis mission's target launch date of January 10, stating that date was "no longer achievable", but they did not indicate when it will be ready for the mission to carry a new European Columbus space laboratory up to the ISS.
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.
Google enables Indians to build maps of their villages, cities
By IANS,
New Delhi : For a vast country which lacks adequately detailed maps for many of its areas, India is now finding an unexpected solution in the form of the Google Map Maker.
Google recently extended its 'map maker' service to India and has, within three weeks of its launch, drawn quite some attention to it in cyberspace.
Supporters of the project started sending messages out via the net, urging friends and colleagues to create their own detailed maps -- by adding details of features in the villages or urban areas where they live.
New technique developed to ‘milk’ ostrich semen
By IANS,
Sydney : Australian researchers have developed what is being touted as the first “animal- and human-friendly” technique of masturbating an ostrich.
The new technique being used by researchers tasked with collecting semen and artificially inseminating the large and rather fearsome birds - as well as their cousins, the emus - relies on the use of a dummy female.
Microsoft rules out new takeover bid for Yahoo
By DPA,
San Francisco : Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer Wednesday ruled out a new takeover bid for troubled web portal Yahoo, but stressed that the software giant was still interested in partnering with Yahoo on search-related products.
Older students less likely to take intellectual risks
By IANS,
Washington : As students get older they become less likely to take intellectual risks such as sharing their tentative ideas when learning science, a new study says.
The study on student willingness to take risks in the name of early scientific exploration has been done by Ronald A. Beghetto, University of Oregon professor of education studies.
It looked at intellectual risk-taking of 585 students in the third- through sixth-grades in seven Oregon elementary schools. Fifty-one percent were girls.
Scientists find signs of flowing water on Mars
By IANS/WAM,
Abu Dhabi : The first signs of flowing water on Mars have been discovered by US scientists, the journal Science reported.
‘Spy aircraft’ that weighs just three grams
By IANS,
Amsterdam : Dutch engineers have developed a miniature remote-controlled aircraft that flies by flapping its wings like a dragonfly, has an on-board camera and weighs just three grams.
Delfly Micro, made by engineers at Delft University of Technology, can fly for approximately three minutes and has a maximum speed of five meters per second, reports Eurekalert.
Vast solar system detected 127 light years away
By IANS,
London : A vast solar system orbiting a sun-like star has been detected 127 light years from the earth.
The planetary system is believed to be the largest ever found beyond the sun.
Astronomers have confirmed the presence of five planets and have tantalising evidence of two more, reports the Telegraph.
The distance of the planets from their parent star follows a regular pattern, similar to that seen in our own solar system. The study is scheduled for publication in the journal Astronomy And Astrophysics.
Digital mammography in Kolkata
By IANS,
Kolkata : A digital mammography machine with stereo-tactic biopsy system was installed at a hospital in Kolkata Tuesday. This new technology will help in prompt and accurate detection of breast cancer that in turn may extend a patient's life by about 20 years, said doctors of the hospital.
The new system - GE Senographe DS workstation - has been installed at B.P. Poddar Hospital and Medical Research Ltd, a multi-facility hospital specialising in oncology, traumatology and breast cancer, in south Kolkata.
British gangs duping people to buy malicious software
By IANS,
London : Britons are being duped to buy malicious software in the guise of anti-virus protection by criminals posing as legitimate IT experts, officials warned Monday.
ISS now ready for six astronauts
By DPA,
Washington : After more than 10 years of construction, the International Space Station is ready to double its crew to six astronauts from around the world in what will be its most international crew ever, the US space agency said Wednesday.
The equipment and supplies have been checked to ensure that there is enough space for three more permanent residents aboard ISS, NASA officials said at a press briefing.
Scientists stumble on world’s first vegetarian spider
By IANS,
Washington : Some 40,000 existing spider species are thought to be strict predators that feed on insects or other animals. Now, scientists have stumbled on what may be the world's first vegetarian spider that feeds on plants.
The research, led by Christopher Meehan of Villanova University and Eric Olson of Brandeis University, has revealed the extraordinary ecology and behaviour in a small specimen known as Bagheera kiplingi, found throughout much of Central America and southern Mexico.
China sets up background atmosphere station in Antarctica
By Xinhua
Zhongshan Station (Antarctica) : China has set up a background atmosphere observation site at Zhongshan station in Antarctica as part of its 24th scientific expedition to the region.
Researchers at Zhongshan station will be able to observe surface ozone and gases like carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, as well as black carbon aerosol.
Genetic materials of starry origin: study
By IANS,
London : In a first, scientists have confirmed that an important component of early genetic material is extraterrestrial in origin.
In a paper in the latest issue of the journal Planetary Science Letters,they have said that some of the raw materials that went into early genetic material have been found in meteorite fragments.
The materials include the molecules uracil and xanthine, precursors to the molecules that make up DNA and RNA, known as nucleobases.
Now, a robotic underwater vehicle powered by ocean movement
By IANS,
Washington : A robotic underwater vehicle that is powered entirely by natural, renewable, ocean thermal energy has been developed, holding out promise of almost indefinite monitoring of the ocean depths for climate and marine life studies.
Researchers have successfully demonstrated the Sounding Oceanographic Lagrangrian Observer Thermal RECharging (SOLO-TREC) autonomous underwater vehicle that uses a novel thermal recharging engine, powered by the natural temperature differences found at different ocean depths.
Gizmo lovers excited over likely launch of 3G iPhone Monday
By Himank Sharma, IANS,
New Delhi : Even as gizmo lovers await the official launch of Apple's new iPhone towards the end of the year, the market in India is abuzz - as in the US - that the company would debut the iPhone ver.2 or the 3G model as early as Monday.
Apple Inc is hosting the World Wide Developers Conference (WWDC) starting Monday in San Francisco and it was during the same conference last year that Apple chief executive Steve Jobs announced the launch date for the original iPhone.
NASA beams chants of ‘Jai Guru Deva’ into outer space
By Dipankar De Sarkar, IANS
London : If there were any outer space aliens out there Monday at the crack of dawn Indian time, chances are they were grooving to a song with the words "Jai Guru Deva... Om".
The words form the beautiful refrain of a famous Beatles song, "Across the Universe", which was beamed into outer space in a celebration of the band's music at 0530 Indian time (midnight GMT).
Space station opens to Tranquility and its picture window
By DPA,
Washington: Astronauts Saturday opened the hatch to the space station's newest room - the Italian-built Tranquility node that will eventually offer a six-sided picture window on space.
NASA television showed the space station and Endeavour shuttle astronauts moving around the opened hatch, through which they installed an airflow system and exercise equipment into the new room. They were also taking dust samples from Tranquility.
तो क्या भारत में प्रतिबंधित होगा वाट्सऐप?
TwoCircles.net Staff Reporter
नई दिल्ली: दुनिया की सबसे बड़ी मैसेजिंग सर्विस वाट्सऐप पर प्रतिबन्ध लगाने के लिए कल सुप्रीम कोर्ट में एक याचिका दायर की...
China’s new carrier rocket to debut in 2014
By Xinhua
Beijing : China's new generation of carrier rocket, the Long March 5, with a maximum payload capacity of 25 tons, will come into use in 2014, said an official with the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology on Sunday.
The rockets will be made in Tianjin and launched in Hainan, said Liang Xiaohong, vice president of the academy and a member of the 11th National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC), the top political advisory body.
China launches orbiter for global navigation system
By IANS,
Beijing : China Sunday launched an orbiter into space for its satellite navigation and positioning network.
It was the third orbiter that China has launched for its independent satellite navigation and positioning network, also known as Beidou or Compass system.
Xinhua news agency reported that the new satellite was launched from the Xichang satellite launch centre in southwestern Sichuan province by a Long-March-III carrier rocket.
Amrita Research develops system for moving vehicles
By IANS
Thiruvananthapuram : Amrita Research Labs (ARL) has developed a solution that delivers high-bandwidth information and multimedia entertainment to moving vehicles.
It has been named Amrita MiTrans.
In a press statement issued here Tuesday, ARL, the research and development division of Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham attached to the Amritananda Mayi Mutt near Kollam, 70 km from here, said more than a dozen engineers and researchers developed this revolutionary technology, which combines the latest advancements in computers and wireless telecommunications.
Scientific breakthrough in creating synthetic blood
By IANS,
London : Scientists have created red blood cells for the first time from spare IVF embryos cells in Britain as part of a multi-million pound project to manufacture synthetic blood on mass-scale.
IVF or In-vitro fertilisation is a process by which egg cells are fertilised by sperm outside the womb.
Researchers relied on more than 100 spare embryos left over from treatment at fertility clinics to establish several embryonic stem cell "lines", reports the Telegraph.
Now biogas from human waste may cook food, light homes!
By IANS
New Delhi : It may sound unpalatable, but it is true - a voluntary agency in Delhi has developed technology to produce biogas from human waste, which it says can help in cooking food and lighting up homes.
Sulabh International, an NGO working in the field of sanitation in India, Friday said that toilets in public places would be a good source to generate biogas.
Google 3D medical browser maps human body
By IANS,
London : Google has developed a new browser that maps the human body in detail.
Shuttle undocks from ISS, heads home
By RIA Novosti
Washington : The U.S. shuttle Endeavour has undocked from the International Space Station (ISS) ending its 12-day mission, which saw a record breaking five space walks, a NASA spokesperson said.
Endeavour, which delivered the first part of the Kibo Japanese laboratory and the Dextre Canadian-made robot, is due to land at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday.
The second and main part of the Japanese laboratory is due to be delivered by space shuttle Discovery in late May.
NASA spacecraft to take images of Apollo landing sites
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Washington : A NASA spacecraft will move 30 km closer to the moon for a week to take clearer images of the Apollo lunar landing sites.
UN ecology experts look to new nature-given technologies
By DPA,
Bonn (Germany) : New technologies gleaned from observing nature are set to provide exciting applications in the decades ahead that will supersede current environmentally destructive practices, UN experts said Wednesday.
Ahmed Djoghlaf, general secretary of the UN Convention on Biodiversity (CBD), called on entrepreneurs to "wake up" to the new possibilities and to "work with nature, not against it."
Djoghlaf was speaking on the sidelines of the ninth conference of the parties to the CBD being held in the German city of Bonn.
World’s oldest shoe found in Armenian cave
By IANS,
London : A perfectly preserved 5,500-year-old leather shoe has been found by a team of international archaeologists in a cave in Armenia.
The cow-hide shoe dates back to 3,500 BC (the Chalcolithic period) and is in perfect condition. It was made of a single piece of leather and was shaped to fit the wearer's foot.
Yahoo to introduce new features to e-mail sevice
By Xinhua
Beijing : Yahoo will introduce new features for its popular web-based e-mail program, taking six weeks to become available to all 254 million Yahoo mail subscribers in 21 languages worldwide, media reports said Monday.
The new version allows users to click on a contact and then select whether to send that person an e-mail, instant message or text message. "You could send an e-mail or instant message if you know the recipient is at the computer — or a text message if the recipient is on the road with a cell phone," the reports added.
Tiny refrigerators to cool future computers
By IANS,
Washington : Laptops and personal computers of the future will be cooled by tiny fridges sitting snugly inside them, according to an Indian American computer scientist.
Unlike conventional fan-based systems, these miniatures would ensure the removal of a greater volume of heat and also improve the performance of the machines, said Indian American Suresh Garimella, of Purdue University, in West Lafayette, Indiana.
Scientists can now predict quake effects within seconds
By DPA
Rome : Italian scientists have said they can now predict the destructive powers of an earthquake just seconds after the start of a tremor, thus providing a potentially life-saving advance warning to affected populations.
Researchers at the University of Naples and at the National Institute of Geophysics and Vulcanology (INGV) in Rome analysed more than 200 earthquakes with magnitudes ranging from 4.0 to 7.4 on the Richter scale and found that the waves generated in the first few seconds of a tremor carry enough information to determine its destructive potential.
New technique to compress light opens doors to optical computing
By IANS,
Mountain View (California) : Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley have devised a way to squeeze light into tighter spaces than ever thought possible, potentially opening doors to new technology in the fields of optical communications, miniature lasers and optical computers.
Partial solar eclipse in Taiwan
By DPA,
Taipei : Tens of thousands of people in Taiwan watched Wednesday's partial solar eclipse, but few said they still believe in superstitions that the eclipse could spell disaster.
In Taipei, clusters of people gathered in squares, parks and on rooftops to try to catch a glimpse of the phenomenon, which appeared as a total eclipse in parts of India, Nepal, China and Japan and a partial eclipse in other areas of Asia.
Delhi Metro deploys ‘record’ 14 tunnel boring machines
By IANS
New Delhi : As many as 14 tunnel boring machines (TBMs) will be deployed simultaneously for laying out the Delhi Metro network in time for the 2010 Commonwealth Games. Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) said no country in Asia has so far put to work so many TBMs at the same time.
"For the first time in any Asian city, 14 TBMs will be used simultaneously for making metro tunnels," DMRC chief spokesman Anuj Dayal told IANS Tuesday.
Experimental flight of GSLV Mark 3 in December: ISRO chief
New Delhi : India will conduct an experimental test of its Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) Mark 3 in mid-December, Indian Space Research Organisation...
Chasing an eclipsed sun through India
By IANS,
New Delhi : There was excitement in the air as a shaded sun peeped from an overcast sky at dawn Wednesday with tens of thousands of people across the country gathering at rooftops, planetariums and parks to watch the century's longest total solar eclipse.
The eclipse started at sunrise in Surat in Gujarat at 5.28 a.m. when the moon started covering the sun and reached its peak at around 6.23 a.m. when the sun was completely obscured by the moon. The eclipse ended at 7.25 a.m.
Wind pattern change may intensify global warming
By IANS,
Washington : Carbon dioxide released from the Antartic Ocean due to shifting wind patterns may drastically increase global warming, say scientists.
Many scientists think that the end of the last ice age was triggered by a change in earth's orbit that caused the northern part of the planet to warm.
This partial climate shift was accompanied by rising levels of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide, ice core records show, which could have intensified the warming around the globe.
Eclipse gazing a big hit with students, say schools
By IANS,
New Delhi : The excitement over the century's longest solar eclipse was not confined to science centres and planetariums. Schools that had organised sun gazing exercises in their premises Wednesday said that it was a big hit with students who made a beeline to watch the phenomenon.
Bringing alive all the science lessons that they have been studying in classrooms, the eclipse gazing events drew a lot of enthusiasm - not just from the students but from the teachers as well.
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.
Toronto firm celebrates ‘victory’ over Microsoft
By Gurmukh Singh, IANS,
Toronto : A tiny Canadian IT firm, which won a big patent-infringement victory against software giant Microsoft Tuesday, couldnt have wished for a better Christmas gift. They are hoping the global publicity will spell growth in its fortunes.
Toronto-based i4i Inc, which will also get $290 million in damages from Microsoft for stealing its software Word, says its victory is "a war cry for talented inventors whose patents are infringed" by corporate sharks. Tuesday's victory will serve as a springboard for growth, i4i executives told the media Wednesday.
Earth Hour: lights, camera, but where’s the action?
By Sid Astbury, DPA,
Sydney : It's easy to poke fun at Earth Hour, an Australian initiative now into its third year in which people around the world are asked to switch off their lights for 60 minutes to show their concern about global warming.
The poster boy for this year's switch-off is British business tycoon and space tourism pioneer Richard Branson, a powerboat racer and sponsor of a fuel-hungry Formula One team and an individual with a giant-sized environmental footprint.
Chandrayaan to look for water on the moon
By IANS,
Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh) : Is there water on the moon? India's lunar explorer, Chandrayaan-1, will try to find out by peeking into the moon's dark corners and sending an American probe to dig there.
When Chandrayaan heads for the moon Oct 22, it will carry on board a 6.5-kg mini synthetic aperture radar (MiniSAR) developed by the Johns Hopkins University applied physics laboratory and the Naval Air Warfare Centre. It will look for water-ice in the permanently shadowed regions of the lunar poles by digging a few metres into the surface.
New infra-red device can remotely detect bombs
Washington: Scientists have developed a new infra-red model that can detect potentially dangerous materials from a distance.
"The idea for this infra-red technology is to...
Agenda for India: Information Technology
TwoCircles.net presents “Agenda for India”. Series editor is Charu Bahri.
Challenges & Solutions
Information technology professionals Amin Ismaili and his wife Shahin Ismaili, both of whom work as Assistant Systems Engineers with TATA Consultancy Services Ltd., identify India’s heavy dependence on markets in the USA as the greatest challenge presently facing the Information Technology (IT) and IT enabled services (ITES, more commonly spoken of as outsourcing) industries.
Robot making competition for schoolchildren
By IANS
New Delhi : School kids can use all their imagination to create robots that obey their command at a competition here on Oct 15. The winners will go on to represent India at the World Robot Olympiad in Taipei in November.
Nano materials likely to impact environment negatively
By IANS,
Washington : Eco-friendly gains derived from the use of nano materials may be offset partly by their manufacturing process, according to research.
Hatice Sengül and colleagues of Illinois University, Chicago, said strict material purity requirements and lower yields may lead to greater ecological burdens than those associated with conventional manufacturing.
In a separate study, Ohio State University researchers found, for example, that the life-cycle environmental impacts may be as much as 100 times greater per unit of weight than those of traditional materials.
Follow nature’s trail to solve universe’s mystery: Scientist-author
By Madhusree Chatterjee, IANS,
New Delhi : If the universe seems mysterious to you, try becoming a 'cosmic detective'! For, nature has left behind many clues to unravel its mystery, says US-based award-winning scientist Mani Bhaumik who has just penned a children's novel on the subject.
"The study of the universe is a mystery - fortunately nature has left behind some telltale clues around us and like a detective we can pick up the clues and follow the trail to solve the mystery," Bhaumik told IANS in an informal chat in the capital.
Scientists, farmers fast to protest Bt Brinjal
By IANS,
Kolkata : A group of scientists, academicians and farmers observed a day's protest fast at the Kolkata Book Fair Saturday against the possible release of genetically modified crop Bt Brinjal for commercial cultivation.
"The volunteers from Green Peace, city-based green body Development Research Communication and Services Centre (DRCSC) and the farmers of an organisation called Seva participated in the fast," Green Peace's sustainable agricultural campaigner R. Jaykrishna told IANS.
Yahoo signs deal with Google after Microsoft talks end
By DPA,
San Francisco : Yahoo has entered an agreement to run some Google's ads on its search pages after acquisition talks with Microsoft
ended in failure, the web pioneer has said.
The deal reached Thursday may add $800 million a year to Yahoo's sales, but the companies will delay implementation till October to give the US Justice Department time for review, Yahoo said.
Bt Brinjal safe for humans, says science ministry
By IANS,
New Delhi : While the government is conducting nationwide public consultations on whether genetically modified brinjal should be commercially released, the science ministry Tuesday endorsed the product, calling it "safe for all".
"As science and technology ministry, we support the clearance of the expert group. It is safe for all," Science and Technology Minister P. Chavan said at the social editors' conference here.
Human intervention alters natural systems: NASA study
By IANS,
Washington : Human intervention has caused widespread climatic alterations like permafrost thawing, premature blooming of plants across Europe and declining lakes in Africa, according to a NASA study.
Cynthia Rosenzweig of NASA and co-author of the study, said it is the first to co-relate global temperature data sets and observed changes in a broad range of physical and biological systems with humans, climate, and impact.
Infrared eye in sky to probe remotest reaches of space
By IANS,
Washington : Seeing into the remotest reaches of space, way beyond the capacity of the most powerful existing (Hubble) telescope, may now be possible with MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument detectors) cameras.
"The MIRI is one of four science instruments aboard the James Webb telescope that is designed to record images and spectra at the longest wavelengths that the Webb can observe," said Matt Greenhouse, NASA project scientist.
Indian teen in Finland, bringing Facebook, Twitter closer
By Rahul Dass, IANS,
Helsinki : Want to know from your mobile phone where to hangout in Delhi or eat out in Beijing? Three teens in Finland, including one from India, are giving final touches to a system that integrates social networking sites like Twitter and Facebook.
They are part of a team of 30 brainy teens who have come to Finland from 16 countries to take part in the week-long Millennium Youth Camp being held in a forested area, abutting a lake, about an hour's drive from capital Helsinki.
Rajat Sharma to launch another 24×7 news channel
By IANS,
New Delhi: Noted TV host and India TV co-founder Rajat Sharma is set to launch a new 24X7 news channel.
Called India TV Wiz, the channel will be a bilingual in Hindi and English and is the first channel to have got an approval after the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) returned to power.
"Wiz will be up in six months, perhaps earlier in the beta form. You will see a truly unique bouquet of content that will make it a nationwide phenomenon. Thanks to its ideator, Wiz will break the mould," Sharma said in a statement released here Wednesday.
US scientists find northern India’s water is vanishing
By IANS,
Bangalore : Using satellite data from the US space agency NASA, American scientists have found that groundwater levels in northern India have been declining by as much as 30 centimetres per year over the past decade. Researchers concluded the loss is almost entirely due to human activity.
Polaris launches software testing lab in Sydney
By Neena Bhandari, IANS
Sydney : Polaris Software, a leading Indian software company, has launched its new software testing laboratory here that will inject Australian $5 million (US$4.5 million) into the state of New South Wales (NSW).
NSW Minister for State Development Ian Macdonald said Monday: "This is about attracting investment from India, instead of the other way around, where our jobs are outsourced to companies based there.
Partial eclipse seen through clouds in Himachal
By IANS,
Shimla : A partial solar eclipse was witnessed amidst partly cloudy skies across Himachal Pradesh Wednesday, officials here said.
"The partial solar eclipse began at 6.24 a.m. and was seen through partly cloudy skies for the maximum three minutes in the many parts of the hill state," R.K. Sood, joint member secretary of the Himachal State Council for Science Technology and Environment, told IANS.
Sood said that a large number of people, especially schoolchildren, witnessed the eclipse through the clouds on the historic Ridge in Shimla.
Moon’s crust may float on hidden sea
By Xinhua
Beijing : vast ocean of water and ammonia may lurk deep beneath the surface of Titan, the intriguing, orange moon of Saturn already known for its blanket of clouds and dense atmosphere, according to scientists.
Astronomers have not directly observed this ocean. However, they said on Thursday that observations made by the Cassini spacecraft of Titan's rotation and shifts in the location of surface features suggest an ocean exists perhaps 100 kilometers below the surface.
Glint of sunlight shows liquid on Saturn’s largest moon
By IANS,
Washington : A glint of sunlight reflected off a lake on Saturn's largest moon Titan has confirmed the presence of liquid on its surface.
The image was captured by NASA's Cassini spacecraft.
Titan has captivated scientists because of its many similarities to the Earth. Scientists have theorised that Titan's cold surface hosts seas or lakes of liquid hydrocarbons, making it the only other planetary body besides the Earth believed to harbour liquid.
‘India to have own satellite navigation system by 2015’
Chennai : India is expected to have its own satellite navigation system by the first quarter of 2015 with four of its satellites in...
Disconnected in Hyperconnected World: How Work, Family Shifts Fuelling Loneliness Epidemic in Post-Pandemic Era
Devanshi Batra, TwoCircles.net
New Delhi: Why does it feel like we are more alone than ever in a world where we are constantly plugged in? Despite...
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.
Facebook ties up with PayPal to collect ad revenue
By IANS,
Los Angeles : Facebook and PayPal Thursday announced a tie-up to use PayPal as the way to pay for Facebook's advertising and developer systems.
Facebook has currently over 400 million users worldwide, including 120 million in the US alone. Owned by eBay, PayPal is the online mode to pay for e-commerce transactions worldwide. It has 81 million accounts in 24 currencies around the world.
Under the tie-up, advertisers around the world will be able to use PayPal to pay for Facebook advertisements, PayPal said in a press release.
Higher CO2 levels delaying autumn leaf colour change
By IANS
London : Scientists across Europe have been recording a strange phenomenon -- a progressive delay in leaves changing colour and falling in autumn, and an earlier re-greening in spring.
Till now, the phenomenon was ascribed to rising global temperatures or global warming.
But a new study by researchers at Southampton University says the increasing level of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere is to be blamed for the phenomena, sciencedaily.com reports.
Five space walks, mock repairs planned for Discovery
By DPA
Washington : US space shuttle Discovery plans a full schedule of five space walks on its next mission to the International Space Station (ISS), set to begin Oct 23, NASA officials said.
Discovery's crew is to bring up and install the Harmony module to serve as a port for additional international laboratories constructed in Japan, Germany and elsewhere.
But NASA officials said Friday they expect to add a fifth space walk to test some new repair equipment that could be used to fix heat-shield damage that can happen to shuttles during launch, according to spaceflightnow.com.
Guidelines for solar plants released
By IANS,
New Delhi : The government Wednesday announced guidelines for off-grid solar applications, as well as roof top and other small solar plants.
"The guidelines that we have released today are meant to tap into the diverse and enormous potential of solar energy in all applications - rural, industrial as well as urban. The guidelines are flexible, simple and market friendly," union Minister of New and Renewable Energy Farooq Abdullah said here Wednesday.
Now barcodes to help hone diagnostics
By IANS,
Sydney : You've seen barcodes on consumer products - now these, or something very similar, will soon be put to medical use.
Ultra-sensitive fluorescent barcodes called nanostrings, developed by Australian scientists, will greatly hone diagnostics and clinical development, according to a new study.
The nanostring will enable a more accurate detection of molecules associated with particular diseases and will be able to identify new molecules associated with diseases, said Krassen Dimitrov of the University of Queensland.
Kolkata couple invent fuel-less, battery-less auto engine
By Aparajita Gupta, IANS,
Kolkata : Kanishk Sinha, 30, and his wife Lipika, 25, chose to do something different from looking for jobs - they invented a fuel-less environment-friendly auto engine.
"This engine is switched on by a chemical reaction between zinc and oxygen; hence it is pollution-free. This technology also increases the durability of the engine," Kanishk Sinha, chairman of the Jasper Motor Vehicle company, told IANS.
He said the engine can be used in cars as well as other vehicles like three-wheelers, apart from water pumps.
History, geography also seem to shape our genome
By IANS,
Washington : History and geography shape our genome, according to a new study.
The movements of humans within and among continents, expansions and contractions of populations and vagaries of genetic chance, have influenced the distribution of genetic variations.
In recent years, geneticists have identified a handful of genes that have helped human populations adapt to new environments within just a few thousand years - a strikingly short time scale in evolutionary terms.
Microsoft, Yahoo meeting on takeover ends without results
By DPA
New York : Key officials from US software giant Microsoft and internet company Yahoo failed to reach agreement in talks over a multi-billion takeover bid, the Wall Street Journal newspaper reported Friday.
Microsoft had launched a takeover bid of originally $45 billon more than two months ago, which was rejected by Yahoo for being too low.
According to the paper, officials were unable to solve their differences of opinion during the meeting, which took place this week at Yahoo's headquarters in Sunnydale, California.
Safe method to clean up toxic nano-materials developed
By IANS,
Washington : A natural, nontoxic method for biodegrading carbon nanotubes could help diminish environmental and health concerns about using such materials.
A Pittsburgh University research team has found that carbon nanotubes deteriorate when exposed to the natural enzyme horseradish peroxidase (HRP), according to a report co-authored by Alexander Star, assistant professor of chemistry in Pitt's School of Arts and Sciences.
Could waste be a source of our energy requirements?
By IANS,
London : Scientists are trying to find answers to one of the most challenging problems existing today -- generating energy without worsening climate change or harming food output.
Researchers are investigating biofuels generated from waste, which is perceived by many as the 'green alternative' to using fossil fuels.
Biofuels seem to be the perfect solution because they are not net producers of harmful by-products, but they can tempt farmers into growing energy crops at the cost of badly-needed food, particularly in poorer countries.