On March 27, 2014, the WHO certified India as polio-free. Three years of no reported cases of wild poliovirus transmission were required to get the certification | Photo Credit: The Hindu Q: Which scientist is credited with developing the first successful vaccine? A: Edward Jenner Q: Which is the only human disease to have been eradicated … Read more
Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost spacecraft casts a shadow on the Moon’s surface in this handout image obtained by Reuters on March 2, 2025. | Photo Credit: Reuters It’s lights out for the first private lunar lander to pull off a fully successful moon mission. Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost lander fell silent over the weekend, wrapping … Read more
Prof. Chandrashekhar M. Biradar is an earth system scientist, green growth activist, and biodiversity and agroecosystem research scholar with over three decades of experience spanning India, America, Africa, West and Central, Asia, and Eurasia. In a conversation with Kumar Buradikatti, he discussed the agrarian crisis and ways to address it. Excerpts from the interview: You … Read more
NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore have safely returned to Earth after an unexpected nine-month mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Their journey concluded with a splashdown off the Florida coast, facilitated by a SpaceX Dragon capsule. Originally scheduled for a brief mission of about a week starting on June 5, complications with … Read more
NASA astronaut Sunita Williams is being helped out of a SpaceX capsule after it splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico, off the coast of Florida, USA, on March 18, 2025. | Photo Credit: NASA Congratulating NASA astronaut Sunita Williams on her safe return to Earth after nine months in space, Indian Space Research Organisation … Read more
In this image taken from video provided by NASA, a SpaceX capsule floats in the Gulf of Mexico, Tuesday, March 18, 2025, after landing off the coast of Florida with NASA astronauts Suni Williams, Butch Wilmore and Nick Hague, and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Gorbunov. | Photo Credit: AP Stuck in space no more, NASA astronauts … Read more
When sound waves are emitted from a source, like a speaker, they diverge as they pass through the air in a phenomenon called diffraction. | Photo Credit: Desmond Lian/Unsplash Audible enclaves are small pockets of sound that are not disturbed by surrounding noise. They are produced by new technologies designed to deliver sounds that only … Read more
Suni Williams and other astronauts greeting each other after the SpaceX capsule docked with the International Space Station on March 16, 2025. | Photo Credit: PTI NASA’s two stranded astronauts began their journey back to Earth aboard a SpaceX capsule on Tuesday (March 18, 2025), marking the end of an unexpectedly prolonged mission. SpaceX crew Dragon splashdown … Read more
The story so far: At around 3 am IST on March 19, a capsule bearing the astronauts Sunita Williams, Barry Wilmore, Aleksandr Gorbunov, and Nick Hague splashed down off the coast of Florida, US. The four were returning from the International Space Station back to the earth; of them, Ms. Williams and Mr. Wilmore were … Read more
Last month, Microsoft announced a new quantum computing chip called Majorana 1 that it expected would “realise quantum computers capable of solving meaningful, industrial-scale problems in years, not decades”. Independent scientists soon raised doubts about this claim — grandiose as it is — but also acknowledged Microsoft had taken on a great challenge to build … Read more
The S. Ramakrishnan Centre of Excellence in Fluid and Thermal Science Research is housed at IIT-M’s Department of Mechanical Engineering. File | Photo Credit: The Hindu A state-of-the-art research facility for fluid and thermal science was commissioned at the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M) here on Monday. The S. Ramakrishnan Centre of Excellence in Fluid and Thermal … Read more
Lithium, a silvery-white alkali metal, was discovered in 1817 when Swedish chemist Johan August identified it within the mineral petalite. Photograph used for representational purposes only | Photo Credit: Dnn87, CC BY 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons In a significant stride towards bolstering strategic resources, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to the United States … Read more
NASA will provide a live coverage of the agency’s SpaceX Crew-9 return to Earth from the International Space Station, beginning with Dragon spacecraft hatch closure preparations at 10:45 p.m. EDT on Monday, March 17. You can check the schedule on https://www.nasa.gov/live NASA and SpaceX launched a crewed mission to the International Space Station (ISS) to … Read more
Whether we are trying to pull off a pickle recipe for our family or trying to impress a gathering with a well-timed joke, a large chunk of our daily cognitive, social, and communicative activities are invested towards making memories, and retrieving old ones. I use the word chunk not because it sounds cool (it undoubtedly … Read more
(1) Key takeaways Tamil Nadu budget 2025 In its final full budget before the 2026 Assembly elections, the M.K. Stalin-led government sought to strike a balance by catering to its core voter base—women and government employees—while addressing key sectors of the economy. The budget has a total disbursement outlay of ₹4,39,293 crores, excluding public debt, … Read more
Watch: Sunita Williams & Butch Wilmore’s return – What happens to astronauts back on earth? | Video Credit: The Hindu The two NASA astronauts were stranded on the International Space Station due to technical issues with their Boeing Starliner spacecraft. On Saturday, the process to bring Williams and Wilmore back to Earth began with a … Read more
NASA video shows Suni Williams and other astronauts greeting each other after the SpaceX capsule docked with the International Space Station, on March 16, 2025. | Photo Credit: PTI A pair of U.S. astronauts stuck for more than nine months on the International Space Station (ISS) will be returned to Earth on Tuesday (March 18, … Read more
A pi symbol hands on a wall in Nafplio, Greece, July 2021. | Photo Credit: Taso Katsionis/Unsplash Mathematics enthusiasts around the world, from college students to rocket scientists, celebrate Pi Day, which is on March 14 every year. The date was chosen because it can be written 3/14 — the first three digits of an … Read more
NASA video shows Suni Williams and other astronauts greeting each other after the SpaceX capsule docked with the International Space Station, on March 16, 2025. | Photo Credit: PTI A pair of U.S. astronauts stuck for more than nine months on the International Space Station (ISS) will be returned to Earth on Tuesday (March 18, … Read more
The Pacific Ocean as seen from an altitude of 35,000 km above mean sea level by the NASA GOES-18 satellite on September 23, 2023. | Photo Credit: NASA It’s that time of the year again. India waits eagerly for the summer monsoon forecast, tinged with some anxiety about whether it will be ‘normal’. The fate … Read more
A study by researchers at IIT Delhi has found that air pollution and climate change will impair solar panel performance in India. It was published in Environmental Research Letters in November 2024. According to the paper, India is the fifth-largest solar power producer worldwide. The country has set a target to produce 50% of its … Read more
ISRO. File | Photo Credit: Reuters The Centre has recently accorded approval for the ambitious Chandrayaan-5 mission to study the Moon, ISRO Chairman V Narayanan said on Sunday (March 16, 2025). At an event to felicitate him for taking over as the Chairman of the Bengaluru-headquartered Indian Space Research Organisation, Narayanan said that unlike the … Read more
Sci-Five | The Hindu Science Quiz: On Telephone A view of Old Telephone at Kerala Saloon in Pondy Bazaar on Monday. START THE QUIZ 1 / 5 | Who is credited with inventing the first practical telephone? Thomas Edison Alexander Graham Bell Nikola Tesla Guglielmo Marconi Alexander Graham Bell is credited with inventing the first … Read more
NASA’s SpaceX Crew-10 crew members walk from the Operations & Checkout Building at the Kennedy Space Center on March 14, 2025. | Photo Credit: Reuters Just over a day after blasting off, a SpaceX crew capsule arrived at the International Space Station on Sunday (March 16, 2025), delivering the replacements for NASA’s two stuck astronauts. … Read more
Did you know that mortality rates from major operations were slashed from around 40% in the second half of the 19th Century, to less than 3% by the end of the first decade of the 20th Century? Current estimates of global mortality rate following major surgery still hovers around 1-4%, suggesting that the vast changes … Read more
The importance of preserving old grasslands as reservoirs of biodiversity, even if it is just as ski slopes, has become clear. Recovered grasslands need more than 75 years of continuous management to regain their biodiversity because specialised pollinators are slow to return. It takes 75 years of continuous management for the plant diversity in recovered grasslands … Read more
Environmental conditions are primarily responsible for the survival of the bacteria | Photo Credit: Dr. Todd Parker Globally, research on climate/environmentally driven infectious diseases has been largely biased towards vector-borne diseases like malaria, dengue, etc. Melioidosis is a bacterial infectious disease caused by Burkholderia pseudomallei, and is primarily acquired by inoculation, inhalation and/or ingestion of soil- and … Read more
Increasing levels of human-caused greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere may reduce the total number of satellites that can safely orbit Earth by up to 66% of the current carrying capacity by the end of the century, under a high-emissions scenario. The findings from the modelling study are described in Nature Sustainability. Previous research has established that … Read more
Aedes aegypti mosquitoes transmit chikungunya virus to people A preliminary study has found that efavirenz — a non-nucleoside inhibitor of HIV virus that is used for treating HIV/AIDS — can be repurposed for the treatment of chikungunya. Currently, no antiviral compound has been approved for treating chikungunya and only a limited number of novel compounds have been tested against … Read more
SpaceX’s next-generation Starship spacecraft atop its Super Heavy booster is launched on its eighth test at the company’s Boca Chica launch pad in Brownsville, Texas, U.S., on March 6, 2025. | Photo Credit: Reuters SpaceX founder Elon Musk said on Saturday (March 15, 2025) its massive Starship rocket would leave for Mars at the end … Read more