It was early 2023. In a ground-floor laboratory at the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) in north Bengaluru, Ph.D candidate Nayan Chakraborty was readying to examine the results of another iteration of an experiment he had been attempting for three months. There was no reason to believe this trial, nearly his 1,000th, would be … Read more
Gold, long seen as a safe haven in times of crisis, is behaving differently this time since the onset of the West Asian conflict on February 28. Since the start of the war, gold prices have fallen sharply. In India, 24-carat gold, which was trading close to ₹1.9 lakh per 10 grams in late January, … Read more
A steroidal cocktail of chemicals in the plant both nurtures and negatively impacts monarch caterpillars. | Photo Credit: AP Canopied with vibrant little star-shaped flowers, the tropical milkweed shrub is a favourite of millions of migrating monarch butterflies in America, which lay their eggs on them, feed on their leaves and stems as caterpillars, and … Read more
The authors said the findings provide key evidence to support the introduction of the typhoid conjugate vaccine in the national immunisation schedule, which is under consideration, the authors said |Image used for representational purpose only | Photo Credit: Hailshadow Antibiotic-resistant typhoid infections accounted for at least 87% of India’s disease-related economic burden in 2023, according … Read more
Image used for representational purpose only. | Photo Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto Seeking to establish central optical devices quality control and vision care regulation a private member bill has been introduced in Parliament recently. The proposed bill, introduced by MP Ajeet Madhavrao Gopchade, seeks to offer remedy to the alleged vulnerability of consumers who according to the bill … Read more
Amy Neville, mother of Alexander, reacts with other mothers and supporters outside the court after the jury found Meta and Google liable in a key test case accusing Meta and Google’s YouTube of harming children’s mental health through addictive social media platforms, in Los Angeles, California, U.S., March 25, 2026. | Photo Credit: Reuters A … Read more
Updating its climate goals, India has pledged that by 2035, 60% of its installed electric capacity will comprise of non-fossil sources. It also aims to reduce by 47% the intensity of emissions per unit of GDP from 2005 level and to increase its carbon sink to 3.5 billion tonnes – 4 billion tonnes. These targets … Read more
“Fossil fuel dependency is ripping away national security and sovereignty, and replacing it with subservience and rising costs,” UN climate change arm executive secretary Simon Stiell told European Union officials and Ministers in Brussels on March 16, 2026, against the backdrop of the U.S.-Israel-Iran war. He added that the disruption serves as an “abject lesson” on the pitfalls … Read more
The story so far: Microplastics, especially nylon fibres, seem to be present rather sparsely in Chennai’s beach sediments but could still wreak long-term ecological damage, new research has cautioned. A study by researchers at V.O. Chidambaram College in Thoothukudi examined the abundance, sources, and ecological risks of microplastics from beach sediment samples from 15 sites … Read more
Millions of people around the world drink mineral water every day because their tap water is unsafe or because they prefer the taste. It’s packed with naturally occurring minerals that support bone and muscle health and governments and health organisations promote it as a clean, reliable source of hydration. What is mineral water? Mineral water … Read more
Military ships and oil tankers dominate how we imagine the Persian Gulf today. Yet beyond this familiar imagery of geopolitics and petroleum lies a mosaic of vulnerable ecosystems. It wasn’t always this way. Just six decades ago, these waters were busy not with warships but fishing boats, and the glittering megacities that now line the … Read more
In December 2025, Telangana’s ruling Congress swept the Rural body local polls, winning 53.7% of gram panchayats. This analysis maps every one of those 12,702 results individually to their assembly constituencies, mandals, and reservation categories, covering 94 rural/semi-urban ACs and 590 mandals. The party inclination of each sarpanch was gathered through district-level reporters on the … Read more
When the conflict in West Asia, which began with the U.S. and Israel’s attack on Iran on February 28, escalated into a regional war, analysts said that the war would last as long as Iran had missiles or until the Gulf nations ran out of interceptors. A significant number of munitions, especially missiles and interceptors, have … Read more
In 2006, London woke up to a tragedy. Six healthy men involved in a phase I clinical trial of theralizumab, a monoclonal antibody (mAb) designed to treat rheumatoid arthritis, developed multiple organ failure. The antibody triggered an intense immune reaction that the researchers didn’t observe in rhesus monkeys in preclinical tests because their immune cells … Read more
Scientists in Geneva took some antiprotons out for a spin — a very delicate one — in a truck, in a never-tried-before test drive that has been deemed a success. If this so-called antimatter came into contact with actual matter, even for a fraction of an instant, it would have been annihilated in a quick … Read more
(1) Indian vessels stranded in the Strait of Hormuz As the war between Iran and U.S. continued, Indian-flagged vessels carrying crucial fuels were stranded near the Strait of Hormuz, a key transit chokepoint now effectively closed. To the Strait’s West, in the Persian Gulf, 22 vessels were stranded, while on the East near the Gulf … Read more
The moon’s surface is covered by ancient lava flows that are often different from those found on the earth. While volcanic rocks on the earth rarely contain more than 2% titanium dioxide (TiO2), some lunar basalts — common volcanic rocks — carry up to 18%, a fact that planetary scientists have struggled to explain for … Read more
For more than a century, physicists have looked for a material that conducts electricity with zero resistance at room temperature — practical enough to transform how the world generates and uses energy. But for a long time, the highest temperature at which a material became superconducting at room pressure was -140 °C. Some other materials … Read more
On March 10, a journal called Science of Climate Change published a paper calling into question the foundations of climate change. The paper concluded that after accounting for some sources of uncertainty in the climate data, the ‘correct’ changes in the oceans’ heat content and Earth’s energy imbalance are practically zero. In other words, the … Read more
The webinar was jointly organised by the Vellore Institute of Technology, Chennai, and The Hindu as part of the series titled “Biotechnology: Role in Industry 5.0 — Sustainable Future Pathways”. Biotechnology graduates are the architects of the next animal science revolution in the country, experts said at a webinar on “Biotech Careers: Food and Nutrition” … Read more
On a cold February morning, Jassuram Khanna, a farmer from Sujau village in Chakrata in Uttarakhand, felt a tightness in his chest on his way to the market. After waiting a few minutes, he called his son Suresh to come and take him to the doctor. They hired a private car and went to the … Read more
A Hudsonian godwit on Minimoy Island in the Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge, Massachusetts, U.S. on August 21, 2017. | Photo Credit: AFP Chasing an endless summer, one shorebird species undertakes a gruelling annual journey from the Arctic to the tip of South America and back — a feat increasingly fraught with peril. The Hudsonian godwit … Read more
From African deserts to the Arctic circle: humans spread across the planet faster and farther than any other wild vertebrate, making us outliers in the animal kingdom. While we occupy 132 million sq. km of land, a typical wild mammal occupies 165 sq. km. How did humans achieve this feat? The answer lies in … Read more
In the 2026-27 budget, the outlay for the PM-KUSUM scheme nearly doubled to Rs 5,000 crore, signalling the government’s renewed emphasis on increasing solar power production centred on India’s farmers. Specifically, the scheme aims to provide energy and water security to farmers, enhance incomes, and decarbonise the farm sector through decentralised solar pumps and power … Read more
On July 29, 2011, the Cassini mission captured five of Saturn’s moons in a single frame with its narrow-angle camera. | Photo Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Last week, the Minor Planet Centre (MPC) announced 15 new moons had been found, four around Jupiter and 11 around Saturn. The Jovian moons were found by the U.S.-based Scott Sheppard … Read more
Around 2.7 million years ago, the world’s oceans cooled by 2.5 C. | Photo Credit: Egle Sidaraviciute/Unsplash Oceans more than gases helped earth cool When researchers recently analysed Antarctic ice cores to reconstruct the earth’s climate over the last three million years, they found that the world’s oceans cooled by 2.5 C, most of it … Read more
A farmer fertilizes rice seedlings in Vayalur near Tiruchi, on Friday | Photo Credit: VENGADESH R The ongoing conflict in West Asia has disrupted global trade, leading to LPG shortages and a surge in crude oil prices. Data now indicate that the crisis could also affect India’s supply of Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG), putting at … Read more
An artist’s impression of an exomoon. Dense hydrogen atmospheres and internal heating could keep these moons habitable for billions of years, finds a study. | Photo Credit: Wiki Commons The Hindu’s weekly Science for All newsletter explains all things Science, without the jargon. In an astonishing discovery in 2009, a mission to the moon chanced … Read more
Are the risks to structures in the Himalayas and north-eastern states from earthquakes overestimated? Scientists, structural engineers, representatives from several government ministries are expected to deliberate and report back to the Cabinet Secretariat in the coming weeks. This follows a ‘withdrawal’ earlier this month by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS) of a set of … Read more
