Technology

By DPA, Hamburg (Germany) : Birds instinctively choose the fruit which is healthy and shun less health-giving food options, German researchers have found. Given a choice, birds flock to fruits with the highest levels of antioxidants known as flavonoids, which boost the immune system. The German researchers offered a group of blackcaps, a common European summertime bird, a choice of two foods containing different amounts of flavonoids. They found that the birds deliberately selected the food with added antioxidants.

By IANS, Beijing : Technology experts in China have warned internet users to be alert against computer viruses based on the Valentine's Day theme.

By IANS, New Delhi: Mongolia Monday said it was looking for increased trade and commerce with India in the fields of mining and information technology. Mongolian leaders, including Prime Minister Sukhbaataryn Batbold and chairman of the Mongolian State Great Hural (Parliament) D. Demberel made known their wish list during their meeting with visiting Lok Sabha Speaker Meira Kumar. A parliamentary delegation led by the speaker is on a five-day day visit to Mongolia.

By IANS, Chandigarh: India's ambitious 5,000-km range Agni-V nuclear-capable missile will be launched soon, a senior scientist said here Sunday.

By IANS, Washington : Researchers have identified a gene which is linked with Labradors collapsing soon after an intense hunting or retrieving exercise, in a condition known as exercise-induced collapse or EIC. In most cases, their legs get wobbly and hind limbs give out, and in rare cases they may die. Labradors are the commonest dog breed in the world. An estimated three to five percent have EIC.

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.

By NNN-PTI, New Delhi : Scientists at India's National Dairy Reserach Institute today said they have cloned the world's first buffalo calf using a technique superior to the one used in cloning 'Dolly' - the sheep. In a statement, scientists of the Animal Biotechnology Centre at the Karnal-based NDRI said the "handguided cloning technique" was an advanced modification of the "conventional cloning technique" used in cloning Dolly. The buffalo calf was born on Feb. 6 at NDRI campus. "The new technique is less demanding in terms of equipment, time and skill," the statement said.

By EFE, Mexico City : The rhinoceros fossils kept in a museum in western Mexico belonged to an ancient rhino species called Teleoceras hicksi that lived more than four million years ago, scientists have said. The fossils were found in the Jalisco state in the 1960s and preserved at the Regional Paleontology Museum in the state capital Guadalajara. "When we learned that nobody had studied the fossils, we took the initiative and today we're describing for the first time a species that had been identified only in the US, lead researcher Ruben Guzman Gutierrez told EFE Thursday.

By Vivien Leue, DPA, Frankfurt : You can find them in cell phones, digital cameras and navigation systems. They are digital storage cards, and they can be enormous - at least in a digital sense - holding hundreds of photos or a plethora of large documents. To transfer their data onto a computer, you can either connect the mobile device to a computer using a USB cable or you can stick the memory card into a card reader. That is a simpler, and in many cases quicker, solution.

By Andrei Kislyakov, RIA Novosti, Moscow : The Sun is beginning another 11-year cycle of activity and considering that the fiery star is to blame for some unfavourable climate changes on the Earth, the coming decade could spell more trouble for our planet. The first measuring instruments of the Sun's activity made their appearance 440 years ago. They showed that our nearest star treats the Earth to more than just solar eclipses.

By Pervez Bari, TwoCircles.net,

By IANS, Washington : A terahertz version of the single-pixel camera developed by Rice University researchers could lead to breakthrough technologies in security, telecom, signal processing and medicine. The research describes a way to replace the expensive, multipixel sensor arrays used in current terahertz imaging systems with a single sensor. Terahertz radiation, which occupies space in the electromagnetic spectrum between infrared and microwave, penetrates fabric, wood, plastic and even clouds, but not metal or water.

By Arun Kumar, IANS, Washington : As the White House hailed India's maiden moon mission as "encouraging" and "exciting", Democratic presidential hopeful, Barack Obama saw it as a reminder to revitalise the US space programme and not let other countries surpass it. "I haven't spoken to the President (George Bush) about it. I saw that story, it was very interesting," White House spokesperson Dana Perino said Wednesday. "We noted it's very encouraging for India, I'm sure, very exciting."

By Richa Sharma, IANS, New Delhi : What makes the earth go around the sun, aeroplanes fly and volcanoes erupt? A group of 35 Delhi school students has been busy unravelling the mysteries of the universe and understanding basic science through a programme prepared by US space agency NASA. The children - from at least eight schools in the capital - were part of a five-day summer camp 'Journey into Outer Space' being run by Mad Science, a global organisation working to spread science literacy among children in the age group of 7-12 years.

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.

By IANS, Sugandha (Hooghly) : Xenitis Telecommunication, a newly floated venture of West Bengal-based conglomerate Xenitis Group, plans to invest Rs.2.5 billion for setting up a mobile handset manufacturing facility in West Bengal.

By IANS, Tehran : Iran Sunday unveiled its plans to launch two homemade communications satellites into orbit by March next year. Mohammad Ali Forghani, head of Iran's space agency, said the satellites would be displayed to public by mid this year, Iranian Fars news agency reported. "These two satellites, which will be tasked with taking photos and sending them to the earth, will be sent to low Earth orbit," he said. The satellites were jointly developed by the Iranian Space Agency and Iranian universities.

By IANS, Beijing : China's largest Internet search engine, Baidu.com, said that its website was paralysed Tuesday morning after coming under a cyber-attack. The search engine later resumed operation. "The reason why Chinese users could not log on to the website was that our domain name server (DNS) in the United States was illegally attacked," Xinhua reported. The company said it was still investigating the problem. "It is rare for Baidu.com to be down for so long as the company boasts high security protection," said Li Tiejun, an IT security engineer of Beijing Kingsoft.

By IANS, Washington : A new analysis based on nearly 150 studies of aggression in children and adolescents, has found that while boys are more aggressive than girls physically, they are the same in indirect attacks like gossiping, rumour mongering and intentionally isolating others. "These conclusions challenge the popular misconception that indirect aggression is a female form of aggression," said Noel A. Card, assistant professor of family studies, University of Arizona and the study's co-author.

By RIA Novosti Moscow : Russia is suspecting the US spy satellite that has gone out of control may have nuclear material onboard and is closely monitoring its movement in orbit, a top defence ministry official has said. "Russian military experts suggest the satellite could have an onboard nuclear power source," said Igor Barinov, first deputy chairperson of the State Duma (parliament) defence committee.

By Xinhua Jakarta : After successfully launching its LAPAN-TUBSAT satellite last year, the Indonesian National Aeronautics and Space Agency (Lapan) is preparing to construct a second generation version of the earth surveillance satellite for orbit in 2010. While the construction of the first satellite took place in Germany, the construction of the next, named LAPAN-A2, will take place in Indonesia entirely under Indonesian engineers, the Jakarta Post daily on Friday quoted Lapan's head Adi Sadewo Salatun as saying.

By Frederick Noronha, IANS, Bangalore : Searching the net might become quite a different experience thanks to an experiment from Yahoo! India called Glue that yields results with visual information. Search in.glue.yahoo.com for the term 'India', for example, and what you find is news, images, links, maps, and even sponsored ads -- all related to the second-most populous country on the planet. "Glue Pages unite your classic search results with visual information from the best sites anywhere on the Web," said Yahoo! India, while recently unveiling this way of finding information.

By Xinhua, Beijing : Jupiter's Great Red Spot appears to have gotten the best of one of its smaller, younger rival as captured in a recent series of images by the Hubble Space Telescope.

By IANS Mumbai : Eminent space scientist G. Madhavan Nair, chairman of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), has been honoured with the M.M. Chugani Memorial Award of the Indian Physics Association for the year 2006. Nair, secretary with department of space, will be presented the award March 18 by Ashok Misra, director of the Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, the association said in a statement here Friday. The award is given for excellence in applied physics and carries a citation, gold medal and cash prize of Rs.100,000.

By IANS, London : NASA's Deep Impact craft flew within 435 miles (700 km) of comet Hartley 2 -- the closest ever any man-made object got to such a celestial body.

By IANS New Delhi : The government has decided to place the contract for launching of GSAT-8/INSAT-4G communication satellites with Arianespace of Europe. The decision was approved by the union cabinet at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Thursday. The cabinet approval has however put a rider, saying "The cost of the project should not exceed $67.5 million or Rs.2.97 billion", said Union Information and Broadcasting Minister Priya Ranjan Dasmunsi while briefing newsmen on the decisions of the cabinet.

By IANS, Agra : Use of robots and computers for surgery on patients with urological problems will be discussed at an international conference on advances in urology, to be held in the city of the Taj Mahal beginning Feb 3. The five-day conference will be attended by over 1,000 Indian and 200 foreign specialists in urology. In the pre-congress workshop, specialists of the American Urological Association will highlight and demonstrate latest robotic assisted laproscopic techniques.

By IANS, Bangalore : "Go green, save planet Earth", "Save planet Earth before it's too late" are some of the appeals a group of Bangalore children has made on a 25-metre long khadi scroll, planned to be sent to the leaders at the ongoing Copenhagen climate summit. "The 25-metre khadi scroll containing messages and signatures of children has been especially designed as an appeal to the world leaders gathered at Copenhagen summit to save the Earth from an imminent environmental crisis," a member of Rotary Green Brigade, a Bangalore-based voluntary organisation, told IANS.

By Xinhua Moscow : A Russian rocket sent a Germany spy satellite into orbit on Thursday night, Itar-Tass news agency reported. The Russian carrier rocket Kosmos-3M lifted off from the Plesetsk space center in the north of European part of Russia at 20:15 Moscow Time (1715 GMT), carrying into orbit the Germany spy satellite SAR-Lupe-4. Lieutenant-Colonel Alexei Zolotukhin, a spokesman for Russia's Space Troops said the satellite is expected to get to the designated orbit at 20:43 Moscow Time.

By IANS, London : Researchers are fabricating the world's smallest silicon sensor that will be extremely powerful and yet consume very little power. The sensor, with applications in bio-sensing and ecological monitoring, is being developed by researchers at the University of Southampton. “Power consumption is a big issue at the moment as devices use current whether they are switched off and on,” said Hiroshi Mizuta, project head.

By Xinhua, Washington : Analysis of recent soil samples taken by of Phoenix lander's from Mars has found possible traces of perchlorate, a highly oxidizing substance, NASA scientists reported Tuesday. However, the mission team noted that further investigation is still needed to confirm the presence of perchlorate salts.

By Shubha Singh, IANS, At an age when people begin to lose interest in many aspects of the world around them, 96-year-old Randall Butisingh not only mastered the intricacies of the internet but also began his own blog, which describes him as one of the world's oldest bloggers and shows him as a man with a remarkable catholicity of interests. The grandson of indentured workers who were taken to Guyana to work on sugar plantations, Butisingh has watched the world transform many times over in the past nine decades and has adjusted himself to the changes.

By IANS, Kanyakumari (Tamil Nadu) : The longest annular solar eclipse of the millennium began at 11.06 a.m. Friday in this Tamil Nadu city as thousands of people converged here to watch the celestial spectacle. Annular solar eclipse occurs when the Sun and the Moon are exactly in line, but the apparent size of the Moon's shadow is smaller than the visible disc of the sun, making it appear like a ring of fire. The eclipse is expected to peak to annular eclipse at 1.15 p.m.

By IANS Mumbai : Leading telecom operator Tata Communications said Wednesday the company has been elected to lead the Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA). The company's vice president of planning and retail business, Prateek Pashine, has been appointed the chairman of WBA, a statement released here said. Into its fifth year of operation, the WBA was created to drive the adoption of wireless broadband technologies and services around the world by developing a common commercial, technical and marketing framework for wireless network interoperability.

AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE GOVERNMENT OF INDIA AND THE INTERNATIONAL ATOMIC ENERGY AGENCY FOR THE APPLICATION OF SAFEGUARDS TO CIVILIAN NUCLEAR FACILITIES download the pdf version of the text. RECOGNIZING the significance India attaches to civilian nuclear energy as an efficient, clean and sustainable energy source for meeting global energy demand, in particular for meeting India's growing energy needs; WHEREAS India is committed to the full development of its national three-stage

By IANS, Washington : Asteroids may not be the dark, dry, lifeless chunks of rock. According to recent research, there is evidence of water ice and organic material on the asteroid 24 Themis. The research led by Josh Emery, assistant professor with the earth and planetary sciences department at the University of Tennessee (UT), found evidence that supports the idea that asteroids could be responsible for bringing water and organic material to earth.

By IANS New York : The American west is heating up more rapidly than the rest of the world, according to a new study that analyses the latest temperature figures. The average temperature rise in the southwest's largest river basin was more than double the average global increase, likely spelling even more parched conditions, ScienceDaily reported.

By IANS, Sydney : World's thinnest nanowires will drive computers super fast in the near future using light, a new research claims.

By IANS, New Delhi : This year's total solar eclipse on Sunday will be missed by sky gazers in India as the celestial phenomenon will not be visible in Asia. The eclipse will be visible from parts of the South Pacific Ocean area and South American countries like Argentina and Chile. A total solar eclipse occurs every 18 months. A solar eclipse occurs when the moon passes between the sun and the earth, and the moon fully or partially covers the sun as viewed from the earth.

Washington : Using NASA's fleet of Earth-observing satellites, scientists have provided estimates for the global water cycle budget for the first decade of the...

By IANS, London : Astronomers on the look out for black holes have stumbled on a star that was fading with a whimper rather than a bang.

By IINA,

By IANS New York : Yahoo! Inc looked to a bright future over the next three years to bolster its argument that it is worth more than what Microsoft Corp offered, but the moves by its Chinese partner underscore investor doubts that the web portal can stay independent. Yahoo! forecast released in a regulatory filing was intended to convince investors that it has a bright future as an independent company, despite a series of recent struggles.

By Xinhua

Beijing : In contrast to the eye-catching uniforms recently unveiled by the People's Liberation Army (PLA) of China, a new line of military wear has been designed to make its users less visible.