Google Maps to appear in petrol pumps
By DPA
San Francisco : Google Maps are moving from the computer to a place where lost drivers might find them more useful - petrol pumps.
The maps, complete with driving directions and information about local facilities, will start appearing on thousands of specially designed petrol pumps across the US beginning early next month, the company announced Wednesday.
Indian American develops tool to image tumours
By IANS
New York : A team of researchers led by Indian American Sanjiv Gambhir has developed a new type of imaging system capable of picturing tumours to a precision of a trillionth of a meter.
The new system, which uses Raman spectroscopy, will be of great use to doctors who are currently hampered by the limited extent to which they can see such tumours.
Using a microscope modified to detect Raman nanoparticles, Gambhir's team was able to see targets a thousand times smaller than what is currently obtainable.
Five billion people to use cell phones in 2010: UN
By IANS,
Madrid: The number of mobile phone users across the world would increase to five billion this year, a UN telecommunication agency said Monday.
The number of mobile phone subscriptions worldwide has reached 4.6 billion and is expected to increase to five billion this year, according to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU).
"Even during an economic crisis, we have seen no drop in the demand for communications services," ITU Secretary-General Hamadoun Toure said.
Astronomers find nearby baby black hole
By DPA,
Washington : Scientists have identified a young black hole formed from an exploding star witnessed 30 years ago.
China launches manned spacecraft on spacewalk mission
By Xinhua,
Jiquan (China) : China launched Friday a manned spacecraft carrying three astronauts on its first-ever spacewalk mission.
The spacecraft Shenzhou VII blasted off from the Jiuquan space centre in the northwestern province of Gansu at about 9:10 p.m. onboard a Long March-2F carrier rocket.
Onboard pilots Zhai Zhigang, Liu Boming and Jing Haipeng are expected to orbit the earth for three days, when one of them will float out of the cabin about 343 km above the earth Friday.
Cast away eclipse superstitions, but view safely
By IANS,
New Delhi : As the world looks forwards to the century's longest total solar eclipse Wednesday, there are superstitions galore in India. But science experts have urged people to do away with "false beliefs" and watch the celestial spectacle -- as long as they do so the right way.
"There are several false beliefs prevalent in our society regarding solar eclipse. Some people even lock themselves up in their homes to avoid 'the bad rays' from the eclipse," said Nehru Planetarium director N. Rathnashree.
China Announces 186-mph Bullet Train
Beijing, Dec 22 (Prensa Latina) China announced on Saturday its first 186-mph bullet train, wholly designed and built in this Asian country.
China thus joins Japan, France and Germany as the fourth country worldwide in position to build state-of-the-art high-speed trains, a spokesman for the Railway Ministry said.
Indian scientists evolve avalanche prediction system
By Richa Sharma, IANS,
New Delhi : In a boon for armed forces personnel deployed in high-altitude areas, defence scientists have developed a system for forecasting avalanches with maximum accuracy to enable corrective measures to be taken.
The system, developed by researchers of the Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE), can predict any given day as an "avalanche day" or "non-avalanche day".
Indian crust sank 200 km after hitting Asian landmass
By IANS,
London : The collision of the Indian and Asian landmasses some 90 million years ago forced the Indian tectonic plate down under the Asian plate to a depth of 200 km - around double of previous estimates - in the earth's mantle, according to a new geological study.
Are animals stuck in time?
By IANS
Toronto : Dogs greet their masters with the same warmth after a five-minute absence - or five hours. Does this mean they do not possess a sense of time?
This question led William Roberts of the University of Western Ontario to experiment with rats. And he found that the rodents did keep track of time after discovering a piece of cheese, but without forming memories of its discovery.
These results suggest that episodic-like memory in rats is qualitatively different from human episodic memory, which involves retention of the point in past time when an event occurred.
Tiny device can help build more powerful computers
By IANS,
Washington : Engineers have fabricated a tiny positioning device that will help build more compact, powerful computer hard drives and practically double the effectiveness of biological sensors.
Called monolithic comb drive (MCD), it can be potentially used as a "nanoscale manipulator" for use in watery environments to probe biological molecules, said Jason Vaughn Clark, an assistant professor of electrical, computer and mechanical engineering at Purdue University, who created the design.
The eclipse behind the clouds – and a dejected Taregna
By Imran Khan, IANS,
Taregna (Bihar) : The overcast skies cast a dampener and the rare celestial event unfolded behind rain clouds, disappointing the many thousands from India and the world. But the clouds did part momentarily to let the crowds glimpse the century's longest solar eclipse. And for some that was enough.
As the morning skies darkened into night over the village, touted as the best place to watch the eclipse, a moved Gaurav Singh said: "It was a memorable moment when I saw the skies dim into night in the early morning and the solar eclipse reached its totality."
3 U.S. scientists to be awarded “Japan Prize”
By Xinhua
Tokyo : Three U.S. scientists were named as laureates of a major Japanese science prize "Japan Prize" on Thursday for their achievement in information communication technology and genetics.
Vinton Gray Cerf, vice president of Google Inc, and Robert Elliot Kahn, chairman of Corporation for National Research Initiatives will receive the 24th Japan Prize in the field of information communication theory and technology, the Science and Technology Foundation of Japan announced.
China to launch space laboratory
By IANS,
Beijing : China will launch its first space laboratory module Thursday, a step which will pave the way for its own space station, China Daily reported.
Killer algae is key player in mass extinction
By IANS,
Washington : Super volcanoes and crashing asteroids corner all the horrific glory for mass extinction, but a new theory suggests lowly algae may be the killer behind the world's great species annihilations.
Today, just about anywhere there is water, there can be toxic algae. The microscopic plants usually exist in small concentrations, but a sudden warming in the water or an injection of dust or sediment from land can trigger a bloom that kills thousands of fish, poisons shellfish, or even humans.
‘The moon is better than any space station’
By Papri Sri Raman, IANS,
Chennai : Even as Chandrayaan-1, India's first unmanned spacecraft to the moon, enters the lunar orbit Saturday, one Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) scientist says the moon is well on its way to becoming the best international space station.
"It will be better than any artificial space station", said P. Sreekumar, head of the space astronomy and instrumentation division at the ISRO satellite centre.
"The moon has resources,"Sreekumar told IANS in an interview.
"To any man-made space station, everything has to be carted from Earth," he said.
Chandrayaan moved to launch platform for rehearsal
By IANS,
Bangalore : India's first lunar spacecraft Chandrayaan-1 has been moved to the launch platform for rehearsals ahead of its Oct 22 launch, a top Indian space agency official said Saturday.
The fully integrated Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C11) with the lunar spacecraft atop was moved to the launch pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, about 80 km from Chennai, and off the Bay of Bengal.
All going well and weather permitting, India's first unmanned lunar mission is set for launch at 6.20 a.m. Wednesday.
A device to ‘hear’ what they can’t see
By IANS
Agra : A group of IT students here have developed a device that can enable the blind to hear what they cannot see or read.
Called 'E-Netra', it costs Rs.2,000-3,000 and it reads texts through an embedded system and converts them into voice that can be heard through earphones.
Right now it can only read text, but later it is likely to pick up prints in Braille script.
The Agra College team that took six months to develop the device and the software to go with it was led by R.K. Sharma and included his assistants Karan, Mayank, Akshat, Khalid and Jitendra.
Chandrayaan on course, will begin moon orbit by Saturday
By IANS,
Gandhinagar : Indian space scientists are hopeful that Chandrayaan-1 will Saturday start orbiting the moon.
"If everything goes right, by Nov 8, Chandrayaan-1 will start circling the moon," said Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) chairman Madhavan Nair here Tuesday.
The last orbit-raising manoeuvres to enter the lunar transfer trajectory were completed Tuesday by the Spacecraft Control Centre at ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command Network (ISTRAC) in Bangalore, he said.
Australian knowhow to ensure ‘live’ coverage of US manned Mars mission
By IANS,
Washington : Whenever the US manned Mars mission materialises, the whole world can watch live TV coverage of the event, thanks to the knowhow provided by an Australian outfit.
John Bunton, senior member of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation's (CSIRO) ICT Centre Wireless Technology lab has designed a novel 'beamformer' capable of providing a live video link from Mars, for which he will be honoured by NASA with its Space Act Board Award Oct 28 in California.
New software to convert ordinary laptops into supercomputers
By IANS,
Washington : A new software will convert ordinary laptops into powerful supercomputers to extract features and patterns from enormously complex data sets.
The tool - a set of problem-solving calculations known as an algorithm - is compact enough to run on computers and laptops with as little as two gigabytes of memory.
It has been designed and developed by scientists at University of California, Davis (UC-D), and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.
Google Earth helps discover massive meteor crater
By IANS,
London : Google Earth has helped spot a meteor crater in Egypt that lay undiscovered, which could help scientists size up risks of potentially catastrophic impacts.
Solar plane takes off for Hawaii from Japan
Tokyo : The Swiss-made solar-powered plane, Solar Impulse 2, on Monday started its second bid at a record-breaking flight across the Pacific Ocean.
According to...
Infosys to develop IT-enabled application for agriculture
By IANS
Mumbai : Software major Infosys Technologies Ltd has partnered with ACDI/VOCA, a non-profit international development organisation, to develop an information and communication technology (ICT)-enabled application to improve the agro supply chain in India.
ACDI/VOCA promotes broad-based economic growth, and develops applications, which fall under growth oriented micro enterprise development (GMED) programme, which is a $6.3 million a USAID-funded initiative.
Flash in the sky appears and disappears
By IANS,
London : Astronomers have discovered a bizarre celestial object that emitted 40 flashes of light before disappearing again.
Described as a hibernating stellar magnet, this weird object initially misled its discoverers showing up as a gamma-ray burst, suggesting the death of a star in a distant part of the universe.
Space shuttle Discovery heads home after 14-day mission
By DPA,
Washington : The US space shuttle Discovery began its earthward journey Wednesday after completing a 14-day mission to carry out further construction and maintenance work on the International Space Station (ISS).
The shuttle is scheduled for landing Saturday at the Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Caneveral, Florida.
Discovery undocked from the ISS for the return journey after a mission in which astronauts carried out three spacewalks chiefly devoted to installing and preparing the Japanese scientific laboratory module Kibo.
Six selected for Mars flight simulation experiment
By RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Six people, who will take part in a 105-day experiment to simulate a flight to Mars, have been selected by scientists at the Moscow-based Russian Institute of Medical and Biological Problems.
Four Russians - astronauts Oleg Artemyev, Sergei Ryazansky, Alexei Baranov, a doctor, and sports physiologist Alexei Shpakov - and two members of the European Space Agency, France's Cyrille Fournier, a civilian pilot, and Germany's Oliver Knickel, a mechanical engineer, will take part in the experiment.
China to introduce nuclear power technologies from Westinghouse
By Xinhua
Beijing : China's State Nuclear Power Technology Co. (SNPTC), officially inaugurated Tuesday, is set to introduce third-generation nuclear power technologies from the Westinghouse Electric Co.
New, potent anti-microbial wash developed
By IANS,
Washington : Scientists have developed a new anti-microbial wash that kills Salmonella and E. coli more effectively and speedily in vegetables, fruits, poultry products and meats.
Made from inexpensive and readily available ingredients that are recognised as safe by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), the new wash is expected to replace chlorine.
At present, a chlorine wash is most widely used to reduce harmful bacteria levels in food products, but it has its limitations. For one, it does not kill all microbes.
Days of pirated CDs, DVDs numbered
By IANS,
Washington : The days of pirated CDs and DVDs are numbered, thanks to a novel optical technique developed by researchers in Spain that can differentiate pirated works from the original.
A technique developed by researchers at the University of Grenada makes it easy to identify whether a CD has been recorded through legitimate channels or just copied.
The cheap, fast and effective method relies on light diffraction on a CD surface to differentiate between original record and illegal copies, a University of Grenada statement said.
Israel ready to share aviation security technology with India
Tel Aviv : Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said his country was "ready and willing" to share with India technology in areas such...
ognizant acquires US analytics firm
By IANS
Chennai : Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation, a Chennai-based global provider of IT and business process outsourcing services, Saturday said that it has completed the acquisition of New Jersey-based marketRx Inc.
MarketRx is a provider of analytics and related software services to life sciences companies in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical devices segments.
With over 430 employees in the US, India and Europe, marketRx enables pharma and biotechnology companies to improve the effectiveness of their sales and marketing operations.
India to host global nuclear physics conference
By IANS
Kolkata : India will host for the first time an international conference on quarks, at the cutting edge of nuclear physics research, with Jaipur playing the host Feb 4-10.
The conference, Quark Matter 2008, is being co-sponsored by Kolkata-based Saha Institute of Nuclear Physics (SINP) and Variable Energy Cyclotron Centre (VECC).
New global map most comprehensive ever
By IANS
New York : A new global map that details the planet's land cover with a resolution 10 times sharper than any of its predecessors is also the most comprehensive ever.
The map is based on 20 terabytes of imagery - the equivalent of data in 20 million books - acquired from May 2005 to April 2006 by Envisat's Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) instrument.
There are 22 different land cover types shown in the map, including croplands, wetlands, forests, artificial surfaces, water bodies and permanent snow and ice.
Underground barriers to stop toxic waste from contaminating water
By IANS,
Sydney : Thousands of garbage dumps are quietly leaking a toxic brew of old and sometimes deadly chemicals into the water consumed or used by millions of people.
Researchers are developing a solution to one of the most urgent problems faced worldwide -- the poisonous fluids which leach out of old rubbish dumps and enter the groundwater.
Indian-American scientist helps uncover medicinal wonders of turmeric
By IANS,
Washington : The yellow spice turmeric, that evokes associations with weddings and other auspicious occasions in India, has potent medicinal properties as well, India-American scientist Krishnan Dhandapani and a colleague have found.
The active ingredient in turmeric not only cuts down one's chances of getting cancer and Alzheimer's disease, but may also reduce the size of a haemorrhagic stroke, said Medical College of Georgia (MCG) researchers.
Timing is critical for patients who often don't know they have had a stroke and may not be seen by a physician for several hours.
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.
Russia launches US telecom satellite
By IANS/RIA Novosti,
Moscow : Russia's Proton-M carrier rocket with US telecom satellite Intelsat-23 blasted off Sunday from the Baikonur space centre in Kazakhstan.
Gmail allows phone calls from computers
By IANS,
New York : Google Inc. Wednesday said its Gmail service will add a feature that allows users to call any phone directly from their computers.
"Starting today, you can call any phone right from Gmail," Robin Schriebman, a software engineer at Google, wrote on the company's blog.
"We've been testing this feature internally and have found it to be useful in a lot of situations, ranging from making a quick call to a restaurant, to placing a call when you're in an area with bad reception," Schriebman wrote.
China calls for technology transfer, fund to address climate change
By Xinhua,
Beijing : A senior Chinese official Thursday called on the international community to evolve a mechanism for technology development and transfer to address climate change problems.
Xie Zhenhua, deputy head of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) said, "the core of the mechanism is technology transfer, including sufficient funds to support the transfer".
Countdown to India’s mission moon begins
By Fakir Balaji, IANS,
Sriharikota (Andhra Pradesh) : As the countdown for the Wednesday launch of lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 on board the polar satellite launch vehicle (PSLV-C11) started early Monday, this spaceport off the Bay of Bengal coast was bustling with activity, excitement and a bit of anxiety.
With the countdown starting at 5.22 a.m., about 1,000 top scientists and technologists are working round-the-clock to send India’s first spacecraft mission beyond earth orbit from the picturesque spaceport, located on an island about 80 km from Chennai.
NASA reschedules shuttle launch for Sunday night
By DPA,
Washington : The US space agency NASA was confident that the repeatedly delayed launch of the space shuttle Discovery would lift off Sunday night for a mission to the International Space Station.
The launch was scheduled for 7.43 p.m. (2343 GMT) Sunday from the Kennedy Space Centre at Cape Canaveral, Florida. Discovery will have seven astronauts on board, including Japanese crew member Koichi Wakata, who is slated to join the permanent crew on the orbiting space station.
Use biotechnology for green development: Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
By IANS,
New Delhi : Biotechnology provides a viable solution to almost every form of environmental damage and the government must pay more attention to it, says Biocon head Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw.
Delivering the seventh Darbari Seth Memorial Lecture organised by The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) here Tuesday evening, Mazumdar-Shaw made a strong pitch for development of biofuels in India without compromising food production in any way.
Obama may abandon NASA’s moon mission plan
By IANS,
Washington : NASA's plan to send another mission to the moon by 2020 may take a U-turn as US President Barack Obama is expected to propose the closure of the space agency's programme in his new budget to be presented before the Congress Monday.
With the release of President Obama's budget request, NASA will finally get the new marching orders, and there won't be anything in there about flying to the moon, The Washington Post reported.
Hathway unplugs Internet services in Chennai
By IANS,
Chennai : The city's first broadband Internet service provider Hathway Cable and Datacom Ltd has unplugged its services here and started refunding its subscribers their dues, officials said.
"We are forced to close down our business. We don't know why. This is the answer I give to all my subscribers," a company official, who did not want to be identified, told IANS.
Part of the Mumbai-based Rajan Raheja group, Hathway Cable has around 50,000 subscribers in the city.
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.
India to launch maiden mission to moon on April 9 next year
By NNN-APP
New Delhi : India has planned to launch its maiden mission to the moon, Chandrayaan-I on April nine next year.
Media reports said the mission planned by Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will be launched from Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Hyderabad.
Quoting Mylswamy Annadurai, Project Director of Chandrayaan-I, the reports said “a launch windows are available for the next two days in case the launch does not happen on that day.”
NASA launches Endeavour space shuttle to ISS
By RIA Novosti
Washington : U.S. space shuttle Endeavour was launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida on Tuesday to deliver the first part of a Japanese lab and a Canadian-built robot to the International Space Station.
"Brilliantly lighting up the dark sky, space shuttle Endeavour roared off Launch Pad 39A at 2:28 a.m. EDT (06:28 GMT)," NASA said.
Chandra observatory detects new space X-ray source
By IANS
New York : Astronomers studying a nearby galaxy with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory have detected a rare type of star system with a black hole that has begun glowing with a new X-ray source.
Usually, when astronomers study the galaxy, called Centaurus A, it's the giant X-ray jets emanating from its heart that steal the show, according to Gregory Sivakoff of Ohio State University.
ISRO to launch new satellite April 28
By IANS
Bangalore : The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) will launch its advanced remote sensing satellite Cartosat-2A, with high resolution stereo cameras and scientific instruments April 28, a space agency official said here Friday.
"We have rescheduled the launch of Cartosat-2A to this month-end. The tentative launch date is April 28. The exact date and time will be finalised in a fortnight after factoring weather and other relevant data," ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair told reporters on the sidelines of a space event.
Google Street View also copied people’s emails, passwords
By IANS,
London : In a major privacy breach, internet search giant Google copied computer passwords and entire emails from households across Britain.
Nanotechnology: science of small with huge opportunities
Chennai, March 24 (IANS) In future we may never have to wash our shirts, thanks to nanotechnology, and we may have nano-shoes that can absorb the shock of an exploding nuclear device.
A. Sivathanu Pillai, one of India's top scientists, discussed all this and many more far-reaching possibilities of nanotechnology, which basically means engineering of systems at molecular level, at an industry meet here last week.
"It is material science at its best," said Pillai, who is chief controller (research and development) at the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).
U.S. researchers create black that’s really black
By Xinhua
Beijing : U.S. researchers say they have made the blackest substance on Earth. So black it absorbs more than 99.9 percent of light.
The material is made from tiny tubes of carbon standing on end and is almost 30 times darker than a carbon substance used by the National Institute of Standards and Technology as the current benchmark of blackness.
Beijing : U.S. researchers say they have made the blackest substance on Earth. So black it absorbs more than 99.9 percent of light.
The material is made from tiny tubes of carbon standing on end and is almost 30 times darker than a carbon substance used by the National Institute of Standards and Technology as the current benchmark of blackness.
Partial lunar eclipse Sunday
By IANS,
New Delhi : Sky gazers throughout India will get an opportunity Sunday to watch a partial lunar eclipse.
"A partial eclipse of the moon will occur in the early hours of Sunday from 1.06 a.m. to 4.15 a.m.," said a statement issued by the ministry of earth science department here.
The lunar eclipse is a partial one and 80 percent of the moon will be eclipsed. But unlike the solar eclipse, it can be seen with naked eyes.
The actual event and its different phases of the lunar eclipse would be seen at the same time all over the world.
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.
Indian scientist elected entomology’s world forum chief
By IANS,
Hyderabad : A scientist from the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Hari C. Sharma, has become the first Asian to be elected president of the 102-year-old International Congress of Entomology (ICE).
Sharma, principal scientist, entomology, was elected at the 23rd International Congress of Entomology, held July 6-12 at Durban, South Africa.
He is the first Asian to be elected the ICE chief in its 102-year history.
Earth-sized planets found beyond solar system
By IANS,
Washington : NASA's Kepler mission has discovered the first Earth-sized planets orbiting a sun-like star outside our solar system, the US space agency has announced.
Magnetic field at Milky Way core 10 times stronger than rest of galaxy
By IANS,
Sydney : The magnetic field at the core of the Milky Way is at least 10 times stronger than the rest of our galaxy, according to a finding that can affect diverse fields from star formation theory to cosmology.
The evidence is significant because it gives astronomers a lower limit on the magnetic field, an important factor in calculating a whole range of astronomical data.
Delhi willing to fund entire project to install CCTVs
New Delhi: The city government on Wednesday told the Delhi High Court that it was willing to fund the entire project of installation of...
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.
Ignore superstitions, watch solar eclipse with proper gear
By IANS,
New Delhi : As the world looks forward to the millennium's longest annular solar eclipse Friday, there are superstitions galore in India. But science experts have urged people to shed "false beliefs" and watch the celestial spectacle the right way.
"People have various false beliefs regarding solar eclipse. Some think that during eclipse 'bad rays' come to earth and they lock themselves up in their homes to avoid it. This is really rubbish and people should shed such superstitions," Nehru Planetarium director N. Rathnashree told IANS.
Journey to NASA owes to AMU: Hashima Hasan
TCN News
Aligarh: For Aligarh Muslim University (AMU) alumna, Dr Hashima Hasan, Program/Discipline Scientist at the NASA, USA, the fascination with space science began when she...
British lab growing human body parts
By IANS,
London: British experts are growing human body parts like nose and ears in laboratory, Daily Mail reported Sunday.
Scientists crack code of drug-resistant TB
Durban(IANS) : South African scientists have sequenced the entire genome of a strain of extremely drug-resistant mycobacterium tuberculosis (XDR-TB).
They hope the information will contribute to developing better diagnostics and treatments for the disease.
The bacteria analysed were taken from a patient in Durban's King Edward VIII Hospital in KwaZulu Natal, science site SciDev.Net reported.
‘Don’t worry about more lethal version of terror bomb’
By IANS,
Washington : Scientists allayed fears that terrorists could produce a new and more destructive version of an explosive used by 'shoe bomber' Richard Reid in 2001 and Palestinian Intifada.
Gerard Harbison, chemist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and colleagues analysed a variety of potential peroxide-based explosives in the same chemical class as triacetone triperoxide (TATP).
NASA schedules final shuttle launches through 2010
By SPA,
Washington : The US space agency NASA issued a schedule Monday for the final 10 shuttle programme missions in 2009-10, DPA reported.
The list includes one launch to the Hubble Space Telescope, seven missions to continue construction on the orbiting International Space Station and two unspecified flights available for unspecified purposes.
16th-century Mexican Indian map offers key to history
By EFE,
Denver : A map painted by Mexican Indians, or indigenous Indians, in the mid-16th century has become a key document for understanding the migration of Mesoamerican people from their land of origin in what is now the US Southwest, according to a scholar at Harvard University Divinity School.
"Five years of research and writing (2002-2007) by 15 scholars of Mesoamerican history show that this document, the Map of Cuauhtinchan 2, with more than 700 pictures in colour, is something like a Mesoamerican Iliad and Odyssey," David Carrasco told EFE in a telephone interview.
Billions of life bearing planets float in the milky way
By IANS,
London : A few hundred thousand billion free-floating life-bearing earth-sized planets may exist in the space between stars in the Milky Way, says a study.
IBM creates world’s smallest 3D map
By IANS,
Washington : IBM scientists have created a 3D map of the earth so small that 1,000 of them could fit on a single grain of salt.
They accomplished this through a new, breakthrough technique that uses a tiny, silicon tip with a sharp apex -- 100,000 times smaller than a sharpened pencil point -- to create patterns and structures as small as 15 nanometre at greatly reduced cost and complexity.
After more than four-year wait, Endeavour set for launch
By DPA
Washington : The last time space shuttle Endeavour flew to the International Space Station (ISS) was November 2002 - the last mission before the accident that destroyed shuttle Columbia in February 2003, killing seven astronauts including Indian born Kalpana Chawla.
Since the tragedy, Endeavour has remained on the ground - a time US space agency NASA used to outfit the shuttle with all available safeguards. Now the newly equipped Endeavour is getting ready for its premiere.
Russia to build new space centre in 2011
By RIA Novosti,
Moscow : The construction of a new space centre in Russia's Far East will start in 2011, a government official said Monday.
Russia currently uses two launch sites for space carrier rockets and ballistic missiles tests: the Baikonur space centre in the Central Asian Republic of Kazakhstan, which it has leased since the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the Plesetsk space centre in northwest Russia.
Indian IT firms will consolidate, focus on Europe, Asia-Pacific
By Gyanendra Kumar Keshri, IANS,
China criticised for serving dog meat to astronauts
By DPA,
Hong Kong : A Hong Kong-based animal welfare charity Thursday criticised China's space programme for serving dog meat to its astronauts.
Yang Liwei, China's first man in space, revealed in his recent autobiography that dog meat was included in the special diet for astronauts preparing for missions.
The Hong Kong-based charity Animals Asia Thursday hit out at the revelation by Yang, who made history when he orbited earth in the Shenzhou 5 spacecraft in October 2003.
Get ready to view a total solar eclipse July 22
By IANS,
Mumbai : A rare celestial treat - a total solar eclipse - will be seen in India in the early hours of July 22. And those planning to give it a miss will have to wait for 78 long years to catch the rare glimpse again!
It will be the third total solar eclipse to be visible in India in the past 15 years, a senior scientist said here. The next total solar eclipse will occur in 2087.
China’s lunar probe to photograph Bay of Rainbows
By IANS,
Beijing : China's lunar probe Chang'e-2 was manoeuvered to an experimental orbit Tuesday evening for taking pictures of the moon's Sinus Iridium or Bay of Rainbows.
India to use Embraer platform for airborne early warning system
By IANS,
New Delhi : In a path breaking development, India and Brazil Thursday inked a deal to jointly develop an airborne early warning and control system (AEWCS) for the Indian Air Force to supplement a larger eye-in-the-sky system it will induct later this year.
The agreement was signed here by S. Christopher, director of the Centre for Airborne Systems (CABS) of the Defence Research and Development Organistion (DRDO) and Luis Carlos Aguiar, Embraer's executive vice president for defence and government markets.
The project is believed to be valued at Rs.18 billion ($415 million).
Crude prices fall further with Iran n-deal
New Delhi: As Iran and the six world powers reached a nuclear agreement by their deadline, crude oil prices fell further on Tuesday, pulled...
Indian space agency’s top official dies in road mishap
By IANS
Bangalore : Rajeev Lochan, scientific secretary to the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), was killed late Friday in a road mishap in Andhra Pradesh, it was announced Saturday.
An ISRO official told IANS on phone that Lochan died along with driver Chandran when the Ambassador car in which they were travelling to Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh from Bangalore on an official trip met with an accident near Pakala, about 40 km from Tirupati.
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.
Cheap laser technology to heal kidney stones
By IANS
Kolkata : Diagnosed with kidney stones, Indrajit Roy wanted to get the best cure at an affordable cost. When a hospital in Kolkata promised to remove the stone in a bloodless laser-aided operation at less than half the fee quoted by other hospitals, his prayers were answered.
Microsoft buys into $15 billion Facebook
By DPA
San Francisco : Microsoft beat off a rival bid from Google to invest $240 million in hit social networking site Facebook, in a deal that values the start-up at $15 billion.
Microsoft's $240 million payment gives it just a 1.6 percent stake in the Silicon Valley start-up founded three years ago by Mark Zuckerberg, 23.
He dropped out of Harvard to develop the company and his 20 percent stake now makes him worth a cool $3 billion.
Earth can recover faster from CO2 emissions
By IANS,
Washington : Cheer up -- the earth may yet be able to recover faster from rising carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions than previously thought.
Day and night to be equally long Saturday
By IANS,
New Delhi : Sky gazers in the capital are looking forward to watch the spring equinox Saturday - when the sun shines directly overhead as viewed from the earth, making the night and day equally long.
According to scientists, equinox marks the beginning of spring in the northern hemisphere and the word 'equinox' is derived from the Latin aequus (equal) and nox (night). Around the equinox, the night and day are approximately equally long.
International space meet begins amid tight security
By IANS
Hyderabad : The 58th International Astronautical Congress (IAC) began Monday amid tight security at the international convention centre in Hitec City. About 2,000 delegates, including heads of global space agencies, are attending the five-day event.
Climate change wreaks havoc on coral reefs worldwide
By IANS,
Sydney : Ocean warming is spurring the incidence of virulent coral diseases, already wreaking havoc on reefs worldwide.
David Bourne and colleagues at the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) said global warming and increased sea surface temperatures presented a major challenge to the health of the world's coral reefs.
Warming has caused significant damage to reefs in recent hot years (particularly 1998 and 2002) by sparking coral bleaching, which is a breakdown in the symbiotic relationship between the coral and its bacterial partner (zooxanthellae).
Fake ‘dislike’ button spreads across Facebook
By IANS,
Washington : Social networking website Facebook, which offers its subscribers only a "like" button for anyone's updates, is now faced with a fake "dislike" button, which is spreading like a virus across the site.
The fake dislike button is followed with a link that takes people to a fake application. Instead of installing a dislike button, the application uses the person's network to continue spreading the fake programme.
Graham Cluley of the British security firm Sophos wrote in a blog that the fake dislike buttons "are going viral" on Facebook.
Online learning helps schoolchildren fare better: study
By IANS,
Sydney : Educationists have developed a new web-based tool that helps primary schoolchildren to concentrate better and develop literacy skills.
The interactive educational software called 'Abracadabra' is designed to help struggling school students aged five to eight years learn basic literacy skills to equip them for the future.
The tool has just undergone a 10-week trial that has been described as a success.
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.
Inventor of DNA fingerprinting sees funny side of it
By Jaideep Sarin, IANS,
Helsinki (Finland) : The scientist who invented DNA fingerprinting in 1984 can't help but see the lighter side of the technology and says it has acquired an entertainment angle now, given the high-profile cases it is used for.
Sir Alec Jeffreys of the Department of Genetics at the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom says he himself has handled some of the highly publicised cases which were nothing sort of entertainment for millions of people across the globe.
Google launches ‘Instant’ service
By IANS,
London : Google search is now faster than before as the company has launched a live-updating service that will save surfers 2-5 seconds of online search time.
Hundreds of new species discovered in the Himalayas
By IANS,
Washington : Over 350 new species, including the world's smallest deer, a "flying frog" and a 100 million-year-old gecko, have been discovered in the Eastern Himalayas, according to a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report.
A decade of research carried out by scientists in remote mountain areas endangered by rising global temperatures brought exciting discoveries such as a bright green frog that uses its red and long webbed feet to glide in the air.
Soviet test site offers insights on nuclear monitoring
By IANS,
Washington : Newly released data from Semipalatinsk, the primary nuclear weapons testing site of the former Soviet Union during the Cold War, can help today's atomic sleuths fine-tune their monitoring of nuclear detonations, according to a study
The data is especially important in light of the fact that only three nuclear tests - back-to-back tests in India and Pakistan in 1998 and a 2006 test in North Korea - have been conducted since the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty of 1996, said Paul Richards of Columbia University
World’s largest telescope spells golden age of astronomy
By IANS,
Toronto : Hailing it as the beginning of a golden age of astronomy, researchers say the latest data beamed back to earth by the Herschel Space Observatory (HSO) is providing them a rare peep into distant galaxies. Herschel is the largest infrared telescope ever launched into space.
Drop in CO2 triggered polar ice sheet formation
By IANS,
Washington : A drop in carbon dioxide (CO2) levels seems to have triggered Antarctic ice sheet formation.
Data from Chandrayaan moon mission to go public
By Bhargavi Kerur, IANS,
Bangalore : Voluminous scientific data, including rare images of the moon, from India's maiden lunar mission Chandrayaan-1 will be made public by the year-end.
"People will have free access to the huge data obtained from our first moon mission on a web portal that will be launched by this year-end," a senior scientist of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) told IANS here.
Scientists innovate hydrogen powered car
By IANS,
London : University of Sunderland scientists have developed a hydrogen-powered car believed to be a step forward in creating a mass-produced green machine.
The team, led by Dirk Kok from the Institute of Automotive and Manufacturing Advanced Practice (AMAP), in partnership with the Centre for Process Innovation at Wilton, have successfully adapted a Nissan Almera to run on hydrogen so that it only emits water from its exhaust.
The HyPower Nissan Almera was unveiled at the Partners4Automotive 2008 conference on Wednesday at the University campus, reports Eurekalert.
New WLAN technology still a work in progress
By DPA
Berlin : It once was a privilege only large companies could afford but now is part of even the most humble student accommodations: Wireless Local Area Networks, better known as WLAN.
China to broadcast spacewalk live
By Xinhua,
Beijing : China will broadcast live the spacewalk by one of its astronauts aboard the Shenzhou spacecraft now in orbit, according to Wang Zhaoyao, spokesperson of the manned space programme.
The spacewalk, or extra-vehicular activity (EVA), slated for 4.30 p.m. Saturday will last about 30 minutes, he told a press conference here Friday.
One of the three astronauts aboard the Shenzhou 7 spacecraft, Zhai Zhigang, Liu Boming and Jing Haipeng, will undertake the spacewalk, Wang said.
Iran ready to send six satellites into space
By IANS,
Tehran : Iran is preparing to launch five to six satellites into the space as part of its aerospace development programme.
"We are currently carrying out a project which will see the design, production and launch of 5 to 6 satellites. We hope to send one satellite into space in the first half of the coming year," Iranian Telecommunications Minister Reza Taqipour said.
"Iran has laid the foundation for the development of its aerospace industry in the past three to four years," Taqipour told Fars News Agency.
Computer programme to help witnesses remember criminals
By IANS,
London : Criminals are having a harder time hiding themselves, thanks to new software that helps witnesses recreate images and recognise suspects relying on principles borrowed from the fields of optics and genetics.
The software, known as EFIT-V system, is being used by 15 police departments in Britain, France and Switzerland. In field trials, it led to twice as many identifications of suspects as traditional methods.
ISRO must market aggressively for global contracts
By R. Ramaseshan, IANS,
The success of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Monday in putting into orbit 10 satellites with a single launch is certainly a commendable achievement marking as it does the second largest number of satellites launched at one go. Now it needs to push aggressively for more contracts in this niche market.
Besides ISRO's own two primary satellites, Cartosat-2A (690 kg) and IMS-1 (83 kg), Monday's payload included seven nanosatellites (1-10 kg class) and one microsatellite (10-100 kg class) from foreign customers, which together weighed about 50 kg.
Scientists engineer potent weapon against cancer
By IANS,
London: Scientists have synthesised a molecule that targets and destroys a key protein responsible for development of cervical and other cancers, says a study.
iPhone to help find your parked car
By IANS,
Daytona Beach (Florida) : A software developed by a US company enables the recently launched Apple iPhone 3G to give turn by turn directions, that help people find their parked vehicles.
The software called G-park utilises the new iPhone's in-built global positioning system (GPS) feature.
After parking a vehicle car, the user hits the "Park me!" button on the phone screen to drop a GPS flag on the parking location.
To find the parked car, the user hits the "Where Did I Park" button and the phone guides the user to the vehicle by giving directions.t
Google 3D medical browser maps human body
By IANS,
London : Google has developed a new browser that maps the human body in detail.
New technology to detect forged signatures
By IANS
Washington : Think twice if you are about to forge a signature. A newly developed technology will help forensic specialists find out when you signed a cheque, the pen you used, and the origin of the ink.
The technology that is used at present can only trace the ink if a piece of the document is soaked in certain solutions.
Washington : Think twice if you are about to forge a signature. A newly developed technology will help forensic specialists find out when you signed a cheque, the pen you used, and the origin of the ink.
The technology that is used at present can only trace the ink if a piece of the document is soaked in certain solutions.
China publishes first picture from lunar probe project
By Xinhua
Beijing : China published the first picture of the moon captured by Chang'e-1 Monday morning, marking the success of the country's first lunar probe project.
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao unveiled the framed black-and-white photo at the Beijing Aerospace Control Center (BACC). The image showed a rough moon surface with scattered round craters both big and small.
The area covered by the picture, about 460 km in length and 280 km in width, is located within a 54 to 70 degrees south latitude and 57 to 83 degrees east longitude, according to BACC sources.
Storage options for the digital generation
By DPA
Washington : Just about everything in our lives is being stored digitally today - music, videos, photographs, documents, arts and crafts, and much more.
That's why the scramble for more data storage - and more versatile data storage - is never-ending. The market has responded with a proliferation of types of data storage designed to meet the needs of everyone.
But the options are dizzying.
To keep from making a costly mistake when buying storage, you need to know what your storage needs are and which type of storage best satisfies those requirements.
Scientists invent bionic eyeball to cure blindness
By DPA,
Hamburg : German scientists have invented a wireless bionic eyeball that can restore vision to patients who have become blind due to retina damage or disease.
The new prosthetic device caps 12 years of research to help these patients. This work has resulted in a unique system - a fully implantable visual prosthesis.
The scientists from the Fraunhofer Institute for Microelectronic Circuits and Systems in Duisburg, Germany, say that the bionic eye can bypass the damaged retina.
The system comprises an implant and an external transmitter integrated in an eyeglasses-frame.
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.
DNA test on yeti hair found in India
By IANS,
London : Scientists propose to conduct DNA tests on some hair said to belong to the mythical yeti. Apparently the hair was collected by a yeti believer in a dense jungle in northeastern India.
Initial tests on the hair carried out by Oxford Brookes University showed they did not match any of the known animals. University officials said they could belong to an as yet unidentified species of animal that many swear to have seen in the Himalayas or in the northeastern forests.
German robot taught to be gentle with humans
By DPA
Hamburg : Like a small child admonished by grownups to be gentle with small animals, a robot in Germany has undergone conditioned programming to ensure that it will not accidentally injure humans.
High-speed industrial robots at factories are still too dumb to know whether they may have injured a human co-worker who inadvertently gets in its way.
"Accidents happen," said robot engineer Sami Haddadin from the German Aerospace Centre Space Agency in Oberpfaffenhofen.
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.
‘N-submarines with missiles offer best second-strike chance’
By IANS,
Kalpakkam (Tamil Nadu): Nuclear-powered submarines with capacity to launch ballistic missiles offer the best second-strike capability for a nation, an Indian naval officer said here Sunday.
"It is the only system that offers safe second-strike capability. The normal range of submarine-launched ballistic missiles will be 8,000 km. Compared to land-based missile launch pads, submarines are difficult to detect," Rear Admiral Michael Moraes, Flag Officer (submarines), told reporters at Kalpakkam, around 45 km from Chennai.
Endeavour blasts off for mission to space station
By DPA,
Washington : Space shuttle Endeavour lit up the Florida coast before dawn Monday as it blasted off for a mission to the International Space Station.
The start, at 10.14 a.m. Greenwich Mean Time was the final night-time launch for the ageing shuttle fleet, which is to be mothballed later this year.
Endeavour is carrying a six-window viewing area that will give astronauts a panoramic look at earth, the station and visiting spacecraft.
A planned Sunday launch for the shuttle had to be postponed due to low cloud cover at the launch site.
Arabsat launches its BADR-6
By NNN-KUNA,
Riyadh : The Arab Satellite Communications Organisation (Arabsat) has announced that it will launch its BADR-6 satellite on July 4.
The BADR-6, manufactured by Astrium of France, will be launched by an Ariane 5 Rocket. It will take place in French Cayanne in South America.
Khalid Balkhyour, Arabsat president and CEO, disclosed Monday that the BADR-6 satellite is an Astrium Eurostar E2000 model and is a multipurpose communications satellite designed to serve the Arab world and neighbouring regions and countries.
Endeavour docks with International Space Station
By DPA,
Washington : The space shuttle Endeavour successfully docked with the International Space Station (ISS) Sunday evening.
The shuttle reached the ISS a few minutes earlier than planned at 22:02 GMT and NASA ground control said the docking high above northern India took place without problems.
The seven-member crew received a warm welcome from the three-member ISS crew as the hatch between the two crafts was opened.
"Welcome Endeavour," said ISS commander Michael Fincke. "We understand that this house is in need of an extreme makeover and you're the crew to do it."
Vibration energy to charge your smart phone!
By IANS,
New York: Vibration energy from a surface like the passenger seat of a moving vehicle to power your smart phone?
Yes. It's possible as...
Optical transmission key to secure, rapid indoor communications
By IANS,
Washington : Light is better than radio waves when it comes to some wireless communications, a new study has found.
Optical communications systems could provide faster, more secure communications with wider bandwidth and would be suitable for restricted areas like hospitals, aircraft and factories.
Sending information via light waves either in physical light guides or wirelessly is not new, but existing wireless systems either require direct line of sight or are diffused and have low signal strength.
Increase in greenhouse gas emissions despite cuts
By IANS,
Washington : Scientists have recorded higher emissions of a greenhouse gas thousands of times more efficient at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, in spite of global efforts to curb its release.
The substance HFC-23 is a by product of HCFC-22, a refrigerant in ACs and refrigerators and a starting material for producing heat and chemical-resistant products, cables and coatings.
ISS astronauts take first steps to move Italy’s Harmony
Washington(DPA) : Two astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) have completed the first of three planned space walks to start a new construction project vital to adding European elements to the orbiting laboratory.
Station commander Peggy Whitson of the US and her Russian colleague, Yuri Malenchenko, completed an almost seven-hour space walk Friday, the first of three to prepare for delivery of the long-awaited European science module Columbus in December.
Dinosaur footprints, fossils found in central Peru
By EFE,
Lima : Hundreds of footprints and the fossilised remains of various prehistoric animals, probably dinosaurs that lived 120 million years ago, have been discovered in the Ancash region of central Peru.
The find came when the Antamina mining company, which is owned by BHP Billiton and Xstrata, among other partners, was building a road from its camp at Yanacancha to the Conococha crossroads, in Huari province, some 400 km northeast of Lima.
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.
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.
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.
Sea urchin holds key to getting minerals from animals
By IANS,
Washington : Mammal teeth and bones, protective shells of molluscs and needle-sharp spines of sea urchins are made from scratch by nature.
The materials of which shells, teeth and bones are composed are the strongest and most durable in the animal world, and scientists and engineers have long sought to mimic them.
Now, biomineralisation may be closer to reality. An international team of scientists has detailed a key and previously hidden mechanism to transform amorphous calcium carbonate into calcite, the stuff of seashells.
New Pluto images puzzle scientists
Washington : NASA's New Horizon spacecraft has captured stunning coloured images of Pluto as it gets ready for a close flyby of...
Google makes large grants to improve public services
By IANS
New Delhi : Google.org, the philanthropic arm of the firm best known for its Internet search engine, will spend over $25 million in grants and investments over the next five to 10 years, the company announced here Friday.
In India, Google.org will provide grants and work closely with NGOs to improve essential public services for the poor. It will give $2 million to the NGO Pratham to conduct an all-India annual status of education report (ASER) as well as for large-scale assessments in the education sector.
Europe’s Columbus docks at space station, finally
By DPA
Washington : After four years' delay and last minute space-walk hitches, the Columbus laboratory docked onto the International Space Station, opening a new chapter for Europe in space flight.
"Columbus is now officially a part of the ISS," NASA officials said Monday on the NASA TV transmission of the docking.
In a precision transfer that took about two hours, a robotic arm operated from inside the space station manoeuvred Columbus out of the cargo bay on the Atlantis shuttle and into its permanent place at the Harmony portal that was installed last year.
Marine organism bypasses photosynthesis for survival
By IANS
Washington : Some marine organisms are able to get much of their energy bypassing photosynthesis - the most vital biological process on earth, responsible for all our food.
Two recent studies by Carnegie Institution scientists suggest that these micro-organisms neither release oxygen nor take in carbon dioxide.
If true, this discovery impacts not only our basic understanding of photosynthesis, but also how micro-organisms in oceans affect rising levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide, Sciencedaily reported.
Finally, a breakthrough on how to harness solar power
By IANS,
Washington : Researchers at the MIT have found a new way to store solar power, a major breakthrough in the search to use the sun and serve the Earth's energy needs in a clean and sustainable way.
Every hour, the sun pours down enough radiation to serve the Earth's energy needs for a year. The trouble is to store that energy cheaply and use it whenever needed.
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.
Ariane lifts-off with Indian-built satellite
By IANS,
New Delhi : An Ariane 5 rocket carrying Indian-built European satellite W2M was launched early Sunday from Kourou spaceport in French Guiana, South America, a TV channel reported.
The satellite was launched at around 4.00 a.m. IST, DD News reported.
The 3,462-kg W2M was designed and built at the satellite centre of the state-run Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in Bangalore at $80 million (Rs.4 billion) for the European satellite operator (Eutelsat) under the ISRO-EADS-Astrium alliance formed in 2006.
India to launch ‘unique’ satellite to study distant glaxies
By NNN-PTI,
Shillong, India : India's space agency along with astronomers from across the country will launch a "unique" satellite later this year to study distant galaxies and black holes.
The Astrosat, scheduled for launch towards the end of the year, will be the country's first satellite entirely dedicated to astronomy.
Astronomers are excited about the prospects thrown up by the Astrosat which is expected to give India an edge in observing the universe.
US Scientist to Warn Congress about Global Warming
By Prensa Latina,
Washington : Scientist James Hansen will warn US lawmakers on Monday about the need to stop global warming, 20 years after he first spoke about the issue in Congress.
Although in 1988 he found a very unreceptive audience, Hansen will appeal to the awareness of the members of the House of Representative to promote the idea that it is still possible to defuse "the global warming time bomb".
Graphene device detects narcotics in a jiffy
By IANS,
London: A new graphene-based device can pinpoint the presence of the tiniest amounts of performance enhancing drugs and steroids, rapidly and accurately, in athletes' blood samples.