2 May 2015: For years, scientists have struggled to explain how India could have drifted northward so quickly. Now, geologists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have unearthed India's rapid move toward Eurasia 80 million years ago that later gave rise to the Himalayas. India was pulled northward by the combination of two subduction zones, regions in the Earth's mantle where the edge of one tectonic plate sinks under another plate. The team sampled rocks from the Himalayan region. India was pulled northward by the combination of two subduction zones. More than 140 million years ago, India was part of an super-continent called Gondwana. Around 120 million years ago, what is now India broke off and started migrating north at about 5 cm per year. The results are published in Nature Geoscience. Link: http://www.nature.com
3 May 2015: Scientists may have discovered a sixth DNA base, changing the way we think about our genetic makeup. DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid), the main component of our genetic material, is formed by combining four parts: A, C, G and T (Adenine, Cytosine, Guanine and Thymine). These parts, or bases, of DNA combine in thousands of possible sequences to provide the genetic variability that makes us human beings. In the early 1980s, a fifth component was added to these four ‘classic’ bases, called methyl-cytosine (mC), which is derived from Cytosine. In the late 1990s, mC was recognized as the main cause of epigenetics. Meaning, it can switch genes on or off depending on needs. It seems alterations in the mC base contribute to the development of many diseases. The findings are published in the journal Cell. Link: http://www.cell.com
4 May 2015: A new website is launched about the 'Butterflies of India' under the same name, with details about rare butterflies from Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram and Meghalaya. Some of the rare species that were rediscovered or photographed for the first time can be found in the website: Lethe ramadeva (Single Silverstripe), Euthalia iva (Grand Duke), Neptis nycteus (Hockeystick Sailer), Lethe gulnihal (Dull Forester), Apharitis lilacinus (Lilac Silverline) and Symbrenthia silana (Scarce Jester). The Department of Science & Technology in the Ministry of Science & Technology and the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) are the patrons of the venture. NCBS works with forest departments to conserve butterflies. The website is trying to bring together tribal welfare societies in the Himalayan and North East regions. Link: www.ifoundbutterflies.org
5 May 2015: A new data by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), an American scientific agency, has revealed that our planet Earth has exceeded the highest ever recorded level of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere surpassing 400 parts per million (ppm) in March, 2015. The data showed that the CO2 concentrations hit 400.83 ppm in March 2015, an increase from the 398.10 ppm recorded in March 2014. Significant rise in CO2 concentration was seen post industrialization, reaching 400 ppm as a global average is a significant milestone. Nearly 300 ppm of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is suitable for the Earth, but CO2 concentration has risen by more than 120 ppm since pre-industrialisation on a global scale. The NOAA's estimate was based on air samples taken from a number of islands. Link: http://research.noaa.gov
6 May 2015: A new type of metallic state of matter has been discovered by an international team of researchers studying a superconductor made from carbon-60 molecules or 'buckyballs'. The team found the new state after changing the distance between neighbouring buckyballs by doping the material with rubidium. The study reveals that the material has a rich combination of insulating, magnetic, metallic and superconducting phases – including the hitherto unknown state, which the researchers termed 'Jahn–Teller Metal'. Led by Kosmas Prassides of Tohoku University in Japan, the study provides important clues about how the interplay between the electronic structure of the molecules and their spacing within the lattice can strengthen interactions between electrons that cause superconductivity. Superconductors are a large and diverse group of materials that offer zero resistance to electrical currents when cooled below a critical temperature (TC). The discovery is reported in Science. Link: http://advances.sciencemag.org
7 May 2015: A new tree species that gives out strong smell of camphor when its leaves and stem are crushed has been reported from southern Western Ghats. The species, which is endemic to the Ghats region of Kerala, was named as Cinnamomum agasthyamalayanum after the type locality, Agasthyamala hills, from where it was reported. Isolated populations were also recorded from Rosemala in Kollam district of Kerala. The find attains significance as this is considered the only endemic species that gives out the smell of camphor. Natural camphor is extracted by distilling the leaves and bark of Cinnamomum camphora. The new species was identified by A.J. Robi, P. Sujanapal and P.S. Udayan of the Kerala Forest Research Institute, Thrissur. The finding is published in the International Journal of Advanced Research. Link: http://journalijar.com
8 May 2015: The mysterious dark material coating some geological features of Jupiter's moon Europa is likely salt from a subsurface ocean, discoloured by exposure to radiation. Presence of sea salt on Europa's surface suggests the ocean is interacting with its rocky seafloor - an important consideration in determining whether the icy moon could support life. For more than a decade, NASA scientists wondered about the nature of the dark material that coats long, linear fractures and other geological features on Europa's surface. One certainty is that Europa is bathed in radiation created by Jupiter's powerful magnetic field. This radiation seems a part of the process that creates it. Electrons and ions slam into the surface of Europa like that from a particle accelerator. The study is published in Geophysical Research Letters. Link: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com
9 May 2015: A team of Indian students, spread across four countries in three continents, have jointly created the world's first airplane that generates its own power by the vibration of its wings. The path breaking idea has made it to the finals of a global competition floated by Airbus. The team which includes students presently studying in Bangalore, Netherlands, US and London envisages a future when the aircraft wings can be dressed in a composite skin that harvests energy from natural vibrations or flex in the wings. The team now travels to Hamburg, Germany, to make their case for the top prize to Airbus. The students uses piezoelectric fibres which gather electrical charges from even the smallest movements during flight, storing the energy generated in battery panels and using it to power auxiliary in-flight systems. Link: https://www.airbus-fyi.com
10 May 2015: A new research has presented the world’s first warm-blooded fish: the Opah. It was by researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Opah is a deepwater predatory fish, which is able to keep its body warm through a specially designed set of blood vessels in the fish’s gills, which allows the fish to circulate warm blood throughout its entire body. Birds and mammals are warm-blooded, while reptiles, amphibians and fish are cold-blooded. The fish has a unique mechanism to keep its body warm. The secret lies in a specially designed set of blood vessels in the fish’s gills, which allows the fish to circulate warm blood throughout its entire body. Only one species of Opah is currently recognized, Lampris guttatus, but there may be several species around the world. The finding is published in Science. Link: http://www.sciencemag.org
11 May 2015: The Zoological Survey of India has completed 100 years since it was first established and to celebrate this venerable milestone, the organization has decided to digitize all its data. As part of its modernization project for which a budget of Rs 25 crores has been earmarked, the organization has started archiving 4,500 publications amounting to over 3,00,000 pages into digital format. This expansive collection of information will be accessible to the public at the click of a button through the website of the Zoological Survey of India. It owns roughly 4 million specimens of zoological interest. The body also boasts of a humongous repository of manuscripts, books, aging illustrations, photos and various publications related to natural history. Apart from the Kolkata headquarters, the documents are also kept at 16 regional centers. Link: http://zsi.gov.in
12 May 2015: Nokia is celebrating its 150th anniversary today. Nokia, the Finnish company began life as a pulp mill making paper before moving into rubber and cabling, eventually ended up ushering in the dawn of the mobile phone age at the end of the 20th century. The predecessors of the modern Nokia were the Nokia Company (Nokia Ab), Finnish Rubber Works Ltd (Suomen Gummitehdas Oy) and Finnish Cable Works Ltd (Suomen Kaapelitehdas Oy).The company's name came from the Nokia town and the Nokianvirta river.Nokia Company's history started in 1865 when mining engineer Fredrik Idestam established a ground wood pulp mill on the banks of the Tammerkoski rapids in the town of Tampere, in southwestern Finland (then, part of the Russian Empire). In September 2013, Microsoft announced that it would acquire Nokia's mobile phone business as part of an overall deal totaling US$ 7.17 billion. Link: http://company.nokia.com/en
13 May 2015: The Indian Space Research Organization is set to test its sophisticated, indigenously-built, Multi-Object Tracking Radar (MOTR) on a rocket flight next month while formal commissioning is expected to take three months time. The MOTR designed and developed by Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) will be tested next month during a PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) rocket flight. Similar radar would cost around Rs 800 crore in the international markets and is mainly used for defence purposes. Only a select group of countries have the capacity to build such radars in the world, like Raythaeon, Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin, of the US, Thales, Canada-Europe, Elta of Israel and NEC of Japan. With this radar, ISRO coul keep a protective eye on space debris which become crucial during re-entry missions. Link: http://www.researchgate.net
14 May 2015: Northrop Grumman, an US aerospace company is planning to build an inflatable propeller plane that could fly through Venus's atmosphere in 2021. The ambitious project would see the plane cruise through the sulfurous skies of Venus for years, sampling the acidic alien atmosphere directly and observe the Venusian surface from 50 kilometres up. Called the Venus Atmospheric Maneuverable Platform (VAMP), the vehicle would have a wingspan of 55 metres with an estimated top speed of 220km/h. It would be flown 50-70km above the surface of Venus, in a region of the atmosphere where the pressure is roughly equal to that on Earth. The temperature at that altitude on Venus is about 150Celsius. The plane would be carried by a spacecraft, and upon arriving the planet, it would enter the atmosphere by itself. Link: http://www.northropgrumman.com
15 May 2015: Today marks the thirty anniversary of the discovery of the Ozone Hole in the ozone layer. Jonathan Shanklin, together with Brian Gardiner and the late Joe Farman, was part of the British Antarctic Survey team which discovered the hole in the ozone layer in 1985. These contained chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) which had eaten through the ozone layer. They were quickly outlawed across the globe once the ozone layer hole was discovered. Manufacturers, who may have felt threatened by the ban on CFCs, instead embraced the ozone hole and used it to their advantage to sell goods which used alternative compounds. Two years after the hole's discovery, an international agreement was made to protect the ozone layer: the Montreal Protocol. The deal, signed in 1987 by 46 states, went on to become the first United Nations treaty to achieve universal ratification. Link: http://www.nature.com
16 May 2014: Within 100 years, rising sea levels caused by global warming could submerge large swathes of coastal land in Kochi, Kerala's second most populous city, scientists at the Goa-based National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) have predicted. Inundation scenarios created by NIO scientists R. Mani Murali and P.K. Dinesh Kumar also warned that Kochi, a city the duo claims has 'expanded rapidly and heavily stressed from environmental perspectives', will create 'harmful effects' for the population as well as the coastal environment and severely impact fishing, agriculture and other socio-economic activity. The city already has the inglorious distinction of having the highest number of Coastal Regulatory Zone (CRZ) violations across Kerala, which if one goes by the study, now stand the risk of being submerged to the sea level rise in the coming years. Link: http://drs.nio.org
17 May 2014: Moving to tighten norms for emissions of major pollutants by coal-based power plants in the country, the environment ministry has proposed a fresh standard for old and new units seeking them to substantially cut down release of health-damaging particulate matter (PM). Since the impact of pollution from coal-based power generation is known to be disproportionately high, the ministry also proposed to add dangerous sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide and mercury in the list of pollutants which need to be cut by both new as well as existing thermal power plants. Releasing the new norms, the ministry had sought opinion of general public over the issue by June 15. The study found that the country's thermal power plants are estimated to withdraw around 22 billion cubic meter of water, which is over half of India's domestic water need. Link: http://www.moef.nic.in
18 May 2014: The genome of Upland Cotton (Gossypium hirsutum) is out. It will allow scientists to engineer superior lines that will clothe, feed and fuel the ever-expanding human population. Upland Cotton has a global economic impact of $500 billion, and is the main source of renewable textile fibres.Upland cotton came into existence more than a million years ago when two separate species hybridized, creating a plant that has multiple genomes, a phenomenon that occurs in about 80 per cent of all plant species. This made the sequencing effort more difficult for the researchers.The sequence should aid cotton breeders with the challenge of breeding new varieties suitable for drought-like conditions and high salinity soils, and that are also able to resist constant threats from pests and diseases. The genome is unveiled in Nature Biotechnology. Link: http://www.nature.com
19 May 2014: NASA is is planning to send microscopic organisms into space to land on the Red Planet, in order to see if they can produce oxygen and therefore pave the way for humans to one day colonize Mars.The experiment follows successful laboratory tests on algae and bacteria and how they react with soil from Mars. NASA experimented in a specially-created 'Dummy Mars' to see if astronauts would be able to use microorganisms from Earth together with the surface of Mars to create life-sustaining oxygen. Experts are confident of being able to land on Mars from 2030 and hope the pioneering new technology will be available at that time. So far during experiments, some minute organisms were capable of making oxygen out of Martian soil which is called regolith. These microscopic creatures were also found to have removed nitrogen from the soil. Link: http://www.nasa.gov
20 May 2015: Today is International Metrology Day. The event is organised jointly by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures and the International Organisation of Legal Metrology, which develops international recommendations aim at aligning and harmonising requirements for instruments worldwide. It is said, many measuring instruments are controlled by law and subject to regulatory control, including the scales used to weigh goods in a shop, instruments to measure environmental pollution and so on. The Day recognized and celebrates the contributions of the people that work in inter-governmental and national organizations throughout the year. The theme for 2015 is ‘Measurements and Light’. The topic was chosen to align with the UNESCO International Year of Light. Link: http://www.worldmetrologyday.org
21 May 2015: To boost the country’s scientific research capabilities, India is planning to build 70 supercomputers at a cost of Rs. 4500 crores. The Indian government is predicting that the work will be ended by 2022. The new supercomputers will be used for research in defence, astronomy, climate, medicine, biology and other research areas that will need massive number crunching capabilities. Department of Science and Technology, Department of Electronics and IT, Indian Institute of Science (IISc) and Centre for Development of Advanced Computing (C-DAC) will be involved in these projects. India, though presently possess nine supercomputers, is far behind countries like China in supercomputing capabilities. Each supercomputer is expected to deliver a floating-point performance of half a petaflop to 20 petaflops initially. But all should be able to deliver 50 petaflops eventually. Link: http://deity.gov.in
22 May 2015: European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), world's largest particle smasher broke the record for energy levels late Wednesday in a test run after a two-year upgrade. Protons collided in the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the record-breaking energy of 13 TeV (teraelectronvolts) for the first time. The LHC's previous highest energy for collisions was eight TeV, reached in 2012. It has the potential to be cranked up to 14 TeV. Experiments at the collider are aimed at unlocking clues as to how the universe came into existence by studying fundamental particles, the building blocks of all matter, and the forces that control them. Before the upgrade, the LHC was used to prove the existence of the Higgs Boson, also known as the God particle, which confers mass. That discovery earned the 2013 Nobel physics prize for those who theorized the existence of the Higgs back in 1964. Link: http://home.web.cern.ch
23 May 2015: ISRO's 1.5 tonne Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV-TD) is provisionally slated to make its maiden flight towards the end of July or August from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota. The Reusable Launch Vehicle (RLV-TD), it is undergoing final preparations at the Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre in Thiruvananthapuram. As of now, there are no plans to use it for a manned mission. After lift off, it will zoom to an altitude of 70km and then execute a soft landing in the Bay of Bengal. The duration of this sub-orbital mission is expected to be around 900 seconds. Interestingly, after it splashes down, the vehicle will sink to the bottom of the sea and for now there are no plans to recover it. ISRO ultimately plans to develop technology to land the shuttle on a runway and a series of hypersonic flight experiments. Link: http://www.isro.gov.in
24 May 2015: Scientists have discovered the most luminous galaxy in the universe to date that shines brightly with light equal to more than 300 trillion Suns. The galaxy belongs to a new class of objects recently discovered by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer or WISE - nicknamed Extremely Luminous Infrared Galaxies, or ELIRGs. The galaxy, known as WISE J224607.57-052635.0, may have a behemoth black hole at its belly, gorging itself on gas. Supermassive black holes grow by drawing gas and matter into a disk around them. The disk heats up to beyond-sizzling temperatures of millions of degrees, blasting out high-energy, visible, ultraviolet, and X-ray light. Because light from the galaxy hosting the black hole has travelled 12.5 billion years to reach us, astronomers are seeing the object as it was in the past. The new study is reported in The Astrophysical Journal. Link: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov
25 May 2015: Scientists, led by an Indian-origin researcher, have successfully converted adult human blood cells into neurons. Researchers can now directly convert adult human blood cells to neurons that are responsible for pain, temperature and itch perception. This means that how a person's nervous system cells react and respond to stimuli, can be determined from his blood. Currently, scientists and physicians have a limited understanding of the complex issue of pain and how to treat it. The artificial pump draws power from chemical reactions, driving molecules step-bystep from a low-energy state to a high-energy state - far away from equilibrium. At present, the artificial molecular pump is able to force only two rings together, but researchers believe it won't be long before they can extend its operation to store more energy. Link: http://www.nature.com
26 May 2015: A sudden and massive ice loss in a previously stable region of Antarctica is causing small changes in the gravity field of the Earth, a new study has found. Though the Southern Antarctic Peninsula showed no signs of change up to 2009, after that multiple glaciers along a vast coastal expanse, measuring some 750km in length, suddenly started to shed ice into the ocean at a nearly constant rate of 60 cubic km, or about 55 trillion litres of water, each year. This makes the region the second largest contributor to sea level rise in Antarctica and the ice loss shows no sign of waning. To date, the glaciers added roughly 300 cubic km of water to the ocean. The changes were observed using the CryoSat-2 satellite, a mission of the European Space Agency dedicated to remote-sensing of ice. Researchers found that the ice surface of glaciers is currently going down by as much as 4m each year. Link: http://www.nasa.gov
27 May 2015: Researchers discovered fossils recently in eastern and central Africa that show formerly unknown human species living between 3.3 and 3.5 million years ago. It's being called Australopithecus deyiremeda, which means 'close relative of all later hominins' in the Afar language.This new species has very robust jaws. In addition, we see this new species has smaller teeth. This ancestor appears to be one of four different species of hominins living at the same time. Australopithecus deyiremeda gives further evidence that Australopithecus afarensis ('Lucy') lived among other early human ancestors. The clear conclusion is that our early ancestors were more diverse than we appreciated. The latest has been unearthed in Afar, Ethiopia. The discovery is published in journal Nature.Link: http://www.nature.com
28 May 2015: The Chicago Science Fest organizers are giving the honors to May 28, because on this day in 585 B.C., a Greek philosopher named Thales of Miletus is said to have accurately predicted a solar eclipse. Herodotus writes that at the time of the eclipse, two kings were engaged in a battle for revenge. Hunters had killed the son of King Cyaxares of Medes, and afterwards fled to Lydia. King Alyattes of Lydia refused to return the hunters. War broke out, and raged on for five years. As, however, the balance had not inclined in favour of either nation, another combat took place in the sixth year, in the course of which, just as the battle was growing warm, day was on a sudden changed into night. This event had been foretold by Thales, the Milesian. Astronomers can calculate the dates of historical eclipses, so they’ve pegged the day to May 28, 585 B.C.Link: http://www.sciencedirect.com
29 May 2015: Graphene could one day be used to create fuel-free spacecrafts. Graphene is made of carbon atoms arranged in a honeycomb lattice and is 200 times stronger than steel, more conductive than copper and as flexible as rubber. It can be used to make a light-powered propulsion system for a spacecraft following the discovery that the material, which is just one atom thick, can turn light into movement. Earlier this year, the scientists from the University in Tianjin in China created a "graphene sponge" that was made by fusing crumpled sheets of graphene oxide. When they cut the graphene sponge with a laser, the light pushed the material forward. Although lasers have been found to move single molecules, the sponge should have been far too large to move. They were able to push the sponge pieces upwards as far as 40cm and move it using just ordinary sunlight. Link: http://www.mse.ucr.edu
30 May 2015: Scientists from the Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) have discovered a new species of Catfish, Glyptothorax senapatiensis, in the Chindwin river drainage in Senapati district of Manipur. The people of the region have been having the six-cm-long freshwater fish as food for long, calling it Ngapang. The fish has a thoracic adhesive apparatus that helps it cling on to the rocky riverbed in mountains against strong currents. All Glyptothorax-genus fish have this characteristic. Northeast India has a rich aquatic biodiversity, with 361 of the 816 fish species found in India present there. Several important species of catfish, a diverse group of fish with barbells resembling cat whiskers, are found in the Northeast region. The paper authored by Kosygin et al is published in Ichthyological Exploration of Freshwaters. Link: http://www.pfeil-verlag.de
