SCIENCE OF THE MONTH: MAY 2012

                                                       
1 May 2012: Hollywood director James Cameron, Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt and space tourism pioneer Peter Diamandis have announced a project that aims to mine the Near Earth Asteroids (NEAs) for precious metals like Platinum and Gold.The first stage of the project by the multi-million company,Planetary Resources Inc.,will see a series of telescopes designed to seek out suitable targets for exploration. The second phase will be with an explorer spacecraft, called the Arkyd Range, which will investigate the asteroids.The project is also in search of water in Asteroids which can be transformed into Hydrogen fuel,making long-distance space travel a reality.Link: http://www.planetaryresources.com

2 May 2012:The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has given clearance for using internet in trains without using data card.It will be for the first time that internet will be operational in moving trains through satellite.Since it is a pilot project the internet service will not be charged from the passengers.Railways have sanctioned Rs 6.30 crore for providing internet facility in Howrah Rajdhani.According to the procedure to be followed, passenger will get a password in his mobile phone after dialling a number given by the Travelling Ticket Examiner. The passenger can make the internet operational with the use of the password.If the pilot project becomes successful,other trains also will get the facility.Link:http://pib.nic.in

3 May 2012:European Space Agency has approved a space mission to explore the icy moons of Jupiter.The JUICE (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) mission will investigate the possibility of "waterworlds" that may harbour life.Its primary target is Ganymede, the Solar System's biggest moon, that is thought to conceal a deep ocean of salty water beneath a thick crust of ice.The Juice spacecraft will also make fly-bys of two other moons, Callisto and Europa, which are also believed to have ice-covered oceans.Juice is scheduled to launch in 2022 and will take eight years to make the long journey to Jupiter.After its arrival in 2030 the spacecraft will spend three years collecting data to be transmitted back to Earth.It will be the first European-led space mission to the outer Solar System.Link:http://sci.esa.int

4 May 2012:The British science journal Nature has published online a Japanese Avian Influenza report that had been suspended because of U.S. fears it could used to wage bioterrorism.The report by the Japanese team, led by professor Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the Institute of Medical Science at the University of Tokyo, suggests that the highly pathogenic H5N1 Avian Flu viruses that have been infecting birds in Asia since the latter 1990s have the potential to spread between mammals, including humans.The researchers also found that the viruses contained a gene called the H5 Haem-agglutinin combined with the genes of H1N1 virus.In last February, the World Health Organization recommended the two reports be fully published, while seeking to suspend their full release for the immediate future.Link:http://www.nature.com

5 May 2012:The Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS), the technology arm of the Indian Railways, has developed a GPS-based solution with help of Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO), to avoid train accidents.ISRO’s INSAT-3C satellite will aid in this and the project is called Satellite Imaging for Rail Navigation (SIMRAN).Trains in future may know each other’s location, and start breaking, in case of danger ahead.The government’s focus is to reduce the number of accidents and installation of real-time monitoring service on all trains by the end of 2013, which would contribute in improving themonitoring.Success of the GPS-based system may help Railways in running trains at high speed.The GPS application will also aid in better train schedules, especially in bad weather.Link:http://simran.in

6 May 2012:Moon was closest to the earth today than it will be on any other night in 2012 and will appear significantly larger. The phenomenon, called "Supermoon", this year coincides with `Buddha Purnima'. Today at 9.05 pm, the distance between the earth and the moon was 3,56,955 km, the closest this year, and the angular size of the moon will be 0.5515 degrees.It was very interesting to note that on May 6, the moon set at western horizon a few minutes before sunrise and then rose again on the same evening about an hour after the sunset.On November 28, the moon will be the farthest from the earth this year and the distance between the two will be 4,06,349 km.Thus, the full moon of today will be about 11% bigger than the full moon of November 28.Link:http://www.nasa.gov
 

7 May 2012:The port city of Thoothukudi will soon boast of a desalination plant with a capacity of generating freshwater up to two million litres daily.In addition to Tuticorin, desalination plants will be set up on the islands of Amini, Chetlet, Kadamath, Kalpeni, Kultan and Andrott, which are all part of Lakshadweep islands.The technology was developed by National institute of Ocean Technology (NIOT) based on low temperature thermal desalination (LTTD) technology. LTTD is a process under which the warm surface sea water is flash-evaporated at low pressure and the vapour is condensed with cold deep sea water.Till date, four LTTD plants have been successfully commissioned in the country, one each at Kavaratti, Minicoy, Agatti, Lakshadweep andChennai.Link:http://www.niot.res.in
 

8 May 2012:Scientists have announced the discovery of a new found crocodile species that may have been the largest to ever roam the Earth, living in East African waters between 4 million and 2 million years ago.These crocodiles that prayed upon human beings, grown larger than 27 feet (8 meters).Christopher Brochu, an associate professor of Geosciences at the University of Iowa, found out the new species while examining enormous fossils housed at the National Museum of Kenya in Nairobi. It took four men to lift the skull of one of the specimens, which were from the Turkana Basin, an area surrounding Lake Turkana in northern Kenya.The study is published in the Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology.Link:http://www.tandfonline.com

9 May 2012:First couple to clone their pet dog, Nina and Edgar Otto spent $155,000 at an auction to have their dead Lab Sir Lancelot cloned to produce Lancelot Encore.Lancelot Encore is the first commercially cloned dog. The process began in 2008, when their 11-year-old dog was diagnosed with, and then died due to, cancer.The cloning was done in conjunction with a San Francisco firm called BioArts and the Sooam Biotech Research Foundation in South Korea.While Lancelot may be the first dog to have ever been commercially cloned, it is not the first pet to be doubled.A cat called Little Nicky earned the title as the first commerically cloned pet when a woman in Texas paid $50,000 for the service.Link:http://sooam.com

10 May 2012:India's Supreme Court has directed the government to suspend a move to reintroduce the cheetah into two sanctuaries, in Madhya Pradesh and an area in Rajasthan.The plan was to import cheetahs from Africa. The Asiatic cheetah vanished from India many decades ago, pursued by trophy hunters and herdsmen to the brink of extinction during the Raj.A senior lawyer told the court that the proposal to reintroduce the cheetah had not been discussed with the National Board for Wildlife and that the African cheetahs and Asian cheetahs are completely different, both genetically and also in their characteristics.Fewer than 100 of the cheetahs remain in Iran,the vast majority of it in Africa.Link:http://www.envlaws.org


11 May 2012:The satellite centre of Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) turned 40 today.ISRO was started as an agreement between India and Russia in 1972, to build the first Indian Satellite Aryabhatta.The agency was formed as the Indian National Committee for Space Research under the leadership of Vikram Sarabhai in 1962. The group was helped and supported under the Department of Atomic Energy.The group taken from the talent pool of India's Nuclear Energy Programme delivered hardly one year later on November 21, 1963 when it held the first successful launch of a Nike-Apache sounding rocket from the Thumba Equatorial Launching Station (TERLS) in Thumba, Kerala.Today, ISRO provides launch services through its commercial arm, Antrix Corporation.Link:http://www.isro.org 


12 May 2012:The earliest known Mayan calendar has been found in an ancient house in Guatemala. Furthermore, there is no sign that the much-hyped myth that the Mayan calendar would end in 2012, and with it the world, has any bearing in reality.All that ended in 2012 was one of its calendar cycles, as per William Saturno of Boston University, who led the exploration and excavation and co-author Anthony Aveni, professor of astronomy and anthropology at Colgate University.The hieroglyphs date back to the ninth century, making them hundreds of years older than the calendars in the Maya Codices, which were recorded in bark-paper books from 1300 to 1521.The ancient Maya predicted the world would continue, that 7,000 years from now, things would be exactly like this.Link:http://www.bu.edu


13 May 2012:Iran plans to establish a world award, which will be named after the Founder of the Islamic Republic, Imam Khomeini.The award will be presented annually to a maximum of two figures, which represent great cultural, political and social currents in the world.The Ministry of Science, Research, and Technology, the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance, the Iranian Academy of Sciences, the Islamic Culture and Relations Organization, and the Institute for the Compilation and Publication of Imam Khomeini’s Works are the main organizers of the award.The winners, which will be selected by a jury composed of 11 to 15 members, will be announced annually on January 31 that marks the anniversary of Imam Khomeini’s return from years of exile in France in1979.Link:http://www.khamenei.ir


14 May 2012:In climate talks beginning today in Bonn, India will oppose the EU's move to start negotiations on the draft of a new climate protocol in 2012 itself.The Indian government is expected to object to the shifting stance of EU that would set the wheels in motion to end the Kyoto Protocol even before the developed world provides its emission reduction targets under the second phase starting in 2013. At Durban last year, a bargain had been struck to have a second commitment period of Kyoto Protocol with the developed countries officially giving their targets under the deal in 2013. In return, the developing countries led prominently by India had agreed to start discussions on a new global deal under the existing convention that would come into play by 2020.Link:http://unfccc.int


15 May 2012:The Indira Gandhi National Open University ( IGNOU) will launch a new online course on biodiversity from 2012 July.The course "Appreciation Programme on Sustainable Management of Biodiversity ( APSMB)" aims to recreate and secure linkages between people and nature.It provides an understanding of biodiversity science in an effort to sensitise people to the threats posed to it while promoting the conservation of biological diversity of ecosystems.The one-month online course can be pursued by graduates in any discipline.Indira Gandhi National Open University was established in 1985 mainly for distance and open education.It is the largest university in the world with 3,500,000 students. IGNOU hosts the Global Mega Universities Network (GMUNET) initially supported by UNESCO.Link:http://www.ignou.ac.in


16 May 2012:SpaceX, owned by the billionaire entrepreneur, Elon Musk, is soon to become the first private company to build a spacecraft in order to dock with the International Space Station.The US Space Shuttle program, which began in 1981, ended with the final voyage of the Atlantis in July 2011.Since then NASA has relied on Russia to deliver Americans to the International Space Station (ISS). On May 19th, the Falcon 9 rocket will launch from the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Florida. Once in space, the rocket will release into orbit the Dragon Capsule, a reusable spacecraft that will then be bound for the space station and will deliver supplies to astronauts aboard.SpaceX will use the Dragon Capsule to transport astronauts to the space station within the next 2 to 5 years.Link:http://www.spacex.com


17 May 2012:The first drug shown to prevent HIV infection won the endorsement of a panel of US federal advisers, clearing the way for a landmark approval in the 30-year fight against the virus that causes AIDS.The new drug is a pill by name Truvada for healthy people who are at high risk of contracting HIV, including gay and bisexual men and heterosexual couples with one HIV-positive partner.Gilead Sciences Inc.,has marketed Truvada since 2004 as a treatment for AIDS. The medication is a combination of two older HIV drugs, Emtriva and Viread.Truvada first made headlines in 2010, when government researchers showed it could prevent people from contracting HIV.AIDS causes the body's immune system to breakdown, leading to infections which are eventually fatal.Link:http://www.gilead.com


18 May 2012:India is moving towards a proposal for government control of the Internet to the United Nations General Assembly.India is pushing for the creation of a forum called ‘Committee for Internet Related Policies' (CIRP) to develop internet policies, oversee all internet standards bodies and policy organizations, negotiate internet-related treaties and sit in judgment when internet-related disputes come up.The catch is that India's formal proposal is for CIRP to be funded by the U.N.run by U.N.'s Conference on Trade and Development arm that report directly to the U.N. General Assembly.At present, the Internet is governed by a voluntary, multi-stakeholder group called ICANN or Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, which keeps the Internet free and decentralized.Link:http://www.icann.org 


19 May 2012:Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) will conduct a crucial test on an indigenously built cryogenic engine, today.The cryogenic acceptance test will take place in Liquid Propulsion Systems Centre at Mahendragiri in Tamil Nadu. If it succeeds, it will be used in the cryogenic stage of the modified version of Geostationary Satellite Launch Vehicle -GSLV Mark III, later this year.It will have a multi-mission launch capability for Geo-synchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO), Low Earth Orbit (LEO), polar and intermediate circular orbits.ISRO's first attempt to use a cryogenic engine on board GSLV had failed on April 15, 2010. A cryogenic engine is a rocket motor that is fired by a mixture of liquid fuels (Oxidiser) such as Hydrogen and Oxygen at very low temperatures.Link:http://www.isro.org


20 May 2012:Bombay Natural History Society and the Katerniaghat Foundation along with Forest Department of Uttar Pradesh are planning to set up a conservation centre for vultures, whose population has drastically fallen in India. Wildlife experts and the state forest department are working out details of the project called Vulture Safe Zone. The project in the Terai region will be funded by the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. Vultures were once one of the most commonly sighted birds in India and neighbouring countries. Their numbers have been falling dangerously since the 1990s in India. Experts mainly blame pesticide and Diclofenac poisoning for this. According to published accounts, the fall in vulture population in 2000-07 was about 44 per cent.Link:http://www.rspb.org.uk


21 May 2012:The Central Minister for Environment and Forests Smt. Jayanthi Natarajan informed the  Lok Sabha today that National Ganga River Basin Authority (NGRBA) in its first meeting decided that under Mission Clean Ganga no untreated municipal sewage and industrial effluents flow into the river by 2020. In order to meet the shortfall in the sewage treatment infrastructure, projects amounting to Rs. 2598.47 crore have been sanctioned under the NGRBA for the states of Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal.Besides, a World Bank assisted project to be implemented over a period of 8 years at an estimated cost of Rs 7000 crore has also been approved for conservation and restoration of water quality of the river Ganga.Link:http://moef.nic.in

22 May 2012:SpaceX - the first private commercial rocket blasted off to the International Space Station today morning.It would be the first commercial, rather than government-operated , spacecraft to dock at the space station, after NASA has ended its Space Shuttle Programme.With success of this flight, SpaceX would begin a $1.6 billion contract to fly 12 cargo missions to the space station.The SpaceX had an aborted liftoff on Saturday morning,and it had to wait until Tuesday at 3.44am for the space station's orbit to line up with the launching pad, enabling the cargo capsule known as the Dragon to be in orbit.On Thursday, it is to fly about 1.5 miles underneath the space station to demonstrate its communication and navigation systems.Link:http://www.spacex.com


23 May 2012:According to Australia's Bureau of Meteorology conditions are likely to approach or exceed the El Nino threshold in the second half of 2012.The El Nino weather pattern is linked to extreme weather around the world including heavy rain and droughts that can hit production of crops and other commodities.

The Australian bureau tracks seven climate models from compatriot meteorology centers around the world, of which five indicate above El Nino conditions, while the remaining two sit on the neutral - neither El Nino or La Nina - and warm border.While the seven models hint at a return to El Nino, the World Meteorological Organization last week said it still maintains its neutral outlook for the second half of 2012.The last El Nino was recorded in 2009/10.Link:http://www.bom.gov.au



24 May 2012: India's first state-of-the-art seismic research and monitoring centre will come up here at a cost of around Rs.400 crore at Hajarmachi in Maharashtra.The centre would also carry out research to ascertain whether there is any link between earthquakes and water storage reservoirs.The centre is in close proximity to one of the oldest and largest irrigation projects in India, Koyna Dam and Karad in the same district (Satara),which is considered an earthquake prone region.Incidentally, Satara is a neighbouring district of Ratnagiri where the 9,900-MW Jaitapur Nuclear Power Project is coming up amidst fears of heightened seismic activities.Besides Doppler Radar systems are installed Mumbai and Nagpur.Link:http://www.imd.gov.in

25 May 2012:The 2nd Sustainable Mountain Development Summit began in Gangtok in Sikkim today.Over 250 delegates from eleven mountainous States and the Darjeeling hills of West Bengal will discuss the key issues of the Indian Himalayan region including the North East for two days.The Summit will also focus on water, mountain livelihoods and communities & forests.The Summit will be concluding with the ‘Sikkim Declaration’ that will highlight key concerns of the Himalayan region tomorrow.The first Summit meet was held in Nainital on the 21st and 22nd of May 2011.The summit is organized by the Ecotourism and Conservation Society of Sikkim in collaboration with the Central Himalayan Environment Association,Nainital,Uttarakhand.Link:http://www.imi-smds2.com


26 May 2012:Climate change may be the main culprit behind the collapse of the Indus Valley Civilization around 4,000 years ago, says a new study.The study, combining the latest archaeological data along with state-of-the-art geoscience technologies, suggested that decline in monsoon rains led to weakened river dynamics, and played a critical role both in the development and the fall of the Harappan culture, which relied on river floods to fuel their agricultural surpluses.The research, which was conducted between 2003 and 2008, also claimed that the mythical Saraswati river was actually not fed by glaciers in the Himalayas as believed. The study is published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.Link:http://www.pnas.org 


27 May 2012:India's first laboratory to study formation of clouds and their interaction with the environment is taking shape at the popular hill station of Mahabaleshwar in Maharashtra. The High Altitude Cloud Physics Laboratory started functioning from an IMD office in the hill station about 100 km from Pune 10 days ago. The location of the research centre, about 1,500 m above the mean sea level, would give scientists an opportunity to study the clouds and study its interaction with the environment.Mahabaleshwar offers a unique location for the experiment receiving nearly 500 mm of rains every year.Construction of the laboratory is expected to start in October, and is likely to be completed by June next year.Link:http://www.imd.gov.in  


28 May 2012:Researchers have succeeded in taking a stunning image of a newly synthesised molecule called Olympicene.The molecule - just over a billionth of a metre across - gets its name because its five linked rings resemble the Olympic symbol.The team, based at IBM Research Zurich, announced its first success with a molecule called Pentacene, five linked hexagonal rings of carbon all in a line.THJe photo of the molecule was taken by University of Warwick researchers Anish Mistry and David Fox using Scanning Tunnelling Microscopy.The molecule show linked ring structures that are reminiscent both of the Olympic rings and a great many compounds made from rings of carbon atoms, including the "miracle material" graphene.Link:http://www2.warwick.ac.uk 


29 May 2012:A team of medical scientists from Toronto University today visited areas of Gorakhpur division affected by Japanese Encephalitis outbreak.The seven-member team, along with experts from National Institute of Virology, Pune visited Kushinagar district and most affected areas of Gorakhpur district.Japanese Encephalitis (JE) is caused by the mosquito bite and usually occurs at the onset of monsoon. However, another type of viral brain fever is also prevailing in the area for last 2-3 years.The scientists have termed the disease as Acute Encephalitis Syndrome, (AES) which affects adults as well. The National Institute of Virology has established a field lab to detect the strains of viruses that cause AES.Link:http://www.who.int 


30 May 2012:A research article published by the scientists of the Centre for Earth Sciences, Bangalore, and Peechi Seismic Observatory, Centre for Earth Science Studies, Thrissur, points out that the increase in the frequency of earthquakes during 2011 in the vicinity of the Idduki reservoir is unusual and is a cause for concern.The study also points out the proximity of the Idukki Dam to the 116-year-old Mullaperiyar Dam upstream of the Periyar River making the questions more compelling.Researchers further note that the area had experienced only very low-level microseismic activity till last year.The study is published in the journal Current Science.Link:http://cs-test.ias.ac.in/cs 


31 May 2012:Seven scientists shared the Kavli prizes, awarded by the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters in partnership with the Kavli Foundation.The prize for Astrophysics is shared by David Jewitt of the University of California, Jane Luu of the MIT Lincoln Laboratory and Michael Brown of the California Institute of Technology.They were cited for discovering and describing the Kuiper Belt.The Neuroscience prize is shared by Cornelia Bargmann of the Rockefeller University in New York, Winfried Denk of the Max Planck Institute for Medical Research in Germany, and Ann Graybiel of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.The prize for Nanoscience goes to Mildred Dresselhaus of MIT.Link:http://www.kavliprize.no