Last week, Niti Aayog member Arvind Virmani said in an interview that while employment is increasing, real wages for regular salaried jobs have not kept up with inflation over the last seven years. Real wages refer to the income a worker earns that is adjusted for inflation. They reflect actual purchasing power. An analysis of … Read more
Victory move: Friedrich Merz with supporters at the party headquarters in Berlin on Sunday, after the national election. | Photo Credit: MARTIN MEISSNER The February 23 parliamentary poll in Germany produced several outcomes, the prominent being a highly fractured verdict. No single political formation’s vote share crossed the 30% mark, though the Christian Democratic Union … Read more
In the 17th-century, a German alchemist named Hennig Brandt was on a quest to find the “philosopher’s stone”, a mysterious object that could turn any ordinary metal into gold. When he realised the golden colour of urine, he believed it contained tiny particles of the precious metal. Brand then collected urine from himself, his family, … Read more
Watch: Why are Southern States resisting Hindi more than others | Video Credit: Thamodharan B The latest exchanges between Tamil Nadu and the Centre over Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA) funds have reignited the long-standing language debate. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin has reaffirmed the State’s opposition to Hindi imposition and reiterated its commitment to … Read more
A person undertakes an early version of the polygraph test. | Photo Credit: US FBI A: A polygraph, also called a lie-detector test, is generally used during interrogation by police. The instrument works by recording physiological functions such as blood pressure, heartbeat, respiration and perspiration. A pneumograph tube is fastened around the person’s chest and … Read more
Climate change is already causing all sorts of problems on Earth, but soon it will be making a mess in orbit around the planet too, a new study finds. | Photo Credit: Getty Images/iStockphoto Climate change is already causing all sorts of problems on Earth, but soon it will be making a mess in orbit … Read more
Milla, a five-year-old female ocelot, lies on a table after undergoing an in vitro fertilization procedure at the Texas State Aquarium in Corpus Christi, Texas, U.S., December 9, 2024. | Photo Credit: Reuters In the race to save the endangered ocelot, scientists are trekking the United States, pursuing fertility treatments and striving to kickstart a … Read more
Questions: 1. Name the type site of the Indus civilisation. A type site in archaeology is a particular place or settlement that defines the culture and/or other characteristics identified with the civilisation. 2. __________ is considered to have been one of the major cities of the Indus civilisation. Located in the Cholistan Desert in Pakistan’s … Read more
Questions: 1. The North Pacific has a plastic trash problem that popularly goes by the name X. But contrary to what it suggests, the problem is spread out over a large area and isn’t easily visible to the named eye. What is X? 2. The west of North America experiences a strange kind of tide … Read more
Understanding how particles such as electrons travel vast distances in space or how they acquire ultra-high energy has been a long-standing puzzle in astrophysics. In fact, physicists’ picture of the manner of energy propagation in the universe is still not fully clear. On January 13, researchers with the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University … Read more
This photo provided by the US Space Force shows the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle-7 parked at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, March 7, 2025. | Photo Credit: USAF/AP The U.S. military’s classified mini space shuttle returned to the earth on March 7 after circling the world for 434 days. The space plane blasted into … Read more
This photo shows forearm bone fragments belonging to an ancient child that appeared to have features from both humans and Neanderthals. | Photo Credit: João Zilhão/AP Scientists have dated the skeleton of an ancient child that caused a stir when it was first discovered because it carries features from both humans and Neanderthals. The child’s … Read more
(1) Karnataka budget tabled in legislature Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah presented his 16th budget in the State legislature on Friday (March 7, 2025) with a record outlay of ₹4.09 crore rupees. Of this, around ₹71,000 crores was marked for capital expenditure. The fiscal deficit target for 2025-26 was set at 2.95%. When it comes to allocations … Read more
An undated image of Intuitive Machines’s lunar lander. | Photo Credit: AP A private lunar lander is no longer working after landing sideways in a crater near the moon’s south pole and its mission is over, officials have confirmed. The news came after the botched landing attempt by Texas-based Intuitive Machines. Launched last week, the … Read more
As countries like the US, China, Russia, and India develop plans for long-term stations on the moon, water available on the moon itself is emerging as a vital resource. Aside from meeting the drinking and sanitary needs of astronauts, scientists are also working on using moon water as fuel for rockets launched from the natural … Read more
Governments and financial institutions take painstaking efforts to consolidate banknotes, cheques, and passports with a variety of security features to protect them from counterfeiting. Yet every so often a counterfeiter emerges who can recreate these features and pass off fake documents as real ones. In response, institutions constantly develop newer and better components that are … Read more
India recorded its warmest February in 124 years this year. The India Meteorological Department has already raised an alarm for March, saying that the month will experience above normal temperatures and more than the usual number of days with heat waves. The period coincides with the beginning of India’s wheat harvest season, and extreme heat … Read more
Who is Thomas Jefferson? A man of many talents, Thomas Jefferson was the third president of the U.S. He was the author of the Declaration of American Independence and a founding father of the country. He was the nation’s first secretary of state (1790-93) and the second vice president (1797-1801) – a position he held … Read more
Dr. Ajay Sood, prior to being appointed as India’s third Principal Scientific Advisor in 2022, was one of India’s foremost physicists at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. He explains to The Hindu where India is positioned in the domains of artificial intelligence and quantum computers and why the world is on the cusp of … Read more
Working dogs take a day to adjust to the change in routine caused by Daylight Savings Time (DST), whereas pet dogs and their owners seem to be unaffected. To investigate how DST impacts domestic dogs, researchers used motion-sensitive watches to monitor the activity patterns of 25 working sled dogs, 29 pet dogs, and their human … Read more
In a new study in the journal Evolution, researchers compared the feathers and bodies of different species of flightless birds and their closest relatives who can still fly. They were able to determine which features change first when birds evolve to be flightless, versus which traits take more time for evolution to alter. All of the … Read more
The Environment Ministry study could locate only three Indus river dolphins. FIle Earlier this week, the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change released the findings of a population study of dolphins found in Indian rivers, putting their numbers at 6,327. These playful creatures with their torpedo-like bodies generate excitement whenever they are spotted. People … Read more
The 100-day intensified TB elimination campaign was launched on December 7, 2024 across 455 intervention districts in 33 States and Union Territories to screen and test for TB among people belonging to the vulnerable or high-risk group — diabetics, smokers, alcoholics, people living with HIV, those with TB in the past, geriatric population, house-hold contacts of TB patients. Besides screening people … Read more
Larsen & Toubro said it is betting on aerospace. File | Photo Credit: Reuters The conglomerate Larsen & Toubro (L&T) said it is betting on aerospace as a potential growth engine, including launch vehicle and satellite manufacturing, as the country cuts reliance on imports and boosts private participation. L&T, considered a bellwether for India’s infrastructure … Read more
Watch: SpaceX Starship explodes in space, again raining debris over Caribbean SpaceX’s massive Starship spacecraft exploded in space on Thursday minutes after lifting off from Texas, causing the FAA to halt air traffic in parts of Florida, in the second straight failure this year for Elon Musk’s Mars rocket programme. Several videos on social media … Read more
Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the first telephone in 1876. Can’t imagine a day without your phone? You have Alexander Graham Bell to thank for that. He invented the first telephone on March 7, 1876 nearly 150 years ago. To honour his contributions to science and technology, March 7 is celebrated as Alexander Graham … Read more
It is common knowledge that the first known use of ballistics in warfare globally was by Tipu Sultan. However, what many might not know is that the Yelahanka Air Force station, where recently the prestigious air show was conducted with much pomp and glory attracting crowds in lakhs, is located not very far from one … Read more
Starship reached nearly 90 miles (150 kilometers) in altitude before trouble struck and before four mock satellites could be deployed [File] | Photo Credit: REUTERS Nearly two months after an explosion sent flaming debris raining down on the Turks and Caicos, SpaceX launched another mammoth Starship rocket on Thursday, but lost contact minutes into the … Read more
The failure of the eighth Starship test, seen here from the ground, comes just over a month after the seventh also ended in an explosive failure. | Photo Credit: Reuters SpaceX’s massive Starship spacecraft exploded in space on Thursday minutes after lifting off from Texas, causing the FAA to halt air traffic in parts of … Read more
