Reply by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) in compliance to the National Green Tribunal (NGT) order dated January 21, 2024 in the matter of ‘News item titled “Feeling anxious? Toxic air could be to blame” appearing in Times of India dated 10.10.2023’. NGT had directed CPCB to file a …
European Space Agency (ESA) officials are heaving a sigh of relief following a report from the US National Research Council that says probes landing on Mars need not be sterilised if they are not conducting extraterrestrial biological experiments (Nature, Vol 358 No 6389). ESA was worried that stringent planet protection …
A study in rural Bangladesh has found victims of watery diarrhoea treated with rice-based oral rehydration solution (rice-ORS) recover faster and require fewer hospitalisations than those treated otherwise (Glimpse Newsletter, Vol 14 No 4). Rice gruel has traditionally been used to treat diarrhoea. Packaged rice-ORS and glucose-ORS were supplied to …
Women are prescribed twice more psychotropic drugs than men, a discovery that has led to much debate in Britain. Is it because women tend to consult psychiatrists whereas men pour their hearts out to their favourite bartenders? Are women more forthcoming than men to doctors? Data suggests men are less …
The climate over parts of Turkey was severely affected in 1991-92 by heavy smoke billowing from Kuwaiti oil-wells set ablaze in the Gulf War. Hunay Evliya, a chemistry professor in the southern Turkish town of Adana, said the smoke led to black rain and the winter was the coldest recorded …
TREE SPECIES in arid and semi-arid lands across the developing world are disappearing due to an increasing demand for fuelwood and fodder and by progressive desertification, all of which is threatening plant genetic material. Arid zone trees, especially genera prosopis and acacia, have been identified as priorities for conservation by …
SCIENTISTS at the University of Delaware have produced an accurate satellite image of sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean, enabling weather experts to track the deadly El Nino, the warm current in the Pacific which brings in its wake droughts to India, Africa and other parts of the world. …
THERE is widespread belief that global warming will melt the polar ice caps and submerge large areas of inhabited lands. But a review of the latest scientific research published in New Scientist (Vol 135 No 1833) points to a totally opposite possibility. Says Garry Davidson of the geology department at …
THE BRITISH Technology Group (BTG) recently licensed Penn Pharmaceuticals to manufacture a "safer paracetamol," according to a report in New Scientist (Vol 135 No 1836). Paracetamol was considered a safe painkiller until it was found that if consumed in large doses, it could be fatal. When broken down in the …
CHILDHOOD malnutrition may not have an influence on adult intelligence, states a study by the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN) in Hyderabad. On the other hand, "the socioeconomic status of the family, especially the educational level, emerges as the most important factor influencing intelligence" (ICMR Bulletin, Vol 2 No 6). …
BEANS are one of the few crops grown for beauty as well as nutrition. Archaeologists in South America have excavated beautiful, multicoloured bean seeds buried with Indians 10,000 years ago. Analysis showed the Indians ate only fresh, young bean pods and seeds. Pottery, which made boiling beans possible, began only …
CORAL reefs in various parts of the world are getting bleached and scientists are debating whether this is an early warning of global warming, or simply a local warming of sea waters. Tom Goreau of the Global Reef Alliance says bleaching results from "expulsion by the coral of their symbiotic …
THOUGH only about 10 per cent of rainforest plants -- far less diverse than ocean life -- have been screened, these have still yielded a number of anti-cancer, anti-viral and anti-inflammatory drugs. Research on marine natural products which are far more diverse did not begin until 1973, but according to …
BELIEVE it or not, water that most people take for granted, is the most researched of liquids and scientists are still trying to determine why it is so fluid and why it has the extraordinary capacity of absorbing heat as its temperature rises. The answer probably lies in water's molecular …
In an ambitious Italian-US experiment, the crew of space shuttle Atlantis tried to release an Italian-made satellite tethered by a 20-km copper cord into orbit -- and failed, when the release mechanism jammed repeatedly. The scientists had hoped to learn about new ways to power spacecraft and how to use, …
PHYSIOTHERAPY researchers in Australia have developed a device that can predict the probability of back pain in humans. Many devices can measure spinal muscle functions, such as strength and endurance, but the Australian device called the Pressure Biofeedback Unit (PBU), can calculate the supportive capacity of muscles that protect the …
WHO MERITED the gold medal and world record for the 4,000 metre individual pursuit event in cycling at the Barcelona Olympics -- Chris Boardman or Lotus Engineering, the manufacturers of the bike? And are Nigel Mansell's eight Grand Prix wins this year a reflection of his skills or a credit …
The silver ant -- Cataglyphis bombycina -- is the undertaker of the Sahara desert -- a role it has been forced to adopt because of its own body limitations and because of a small lurking, desert lizard that loves to gobble them alive. Rudiger Wehner of Zurich University began a …
THE DISCOVERY that bird brains call appreciate the finer nuances of music has a learn of scientists harmonising at Rockefeller University in New York. The scientists, led 13, Claudio Mello, have identified a Aile in song- birds that responds to music made by other birds. Scientists studying canaries and zebra …
STEWART Cole and his team of scientists at the Pasteur Institute in Paris have discovered that the absence of a single large gene is responsible for making certain strains of tuberculosis bacteria resistant to isoniazid, the principal drug used to treat the disease. (Nature, Vol 358, No 6387) On reinserting …
PIGS MAY may now rule the heart's of men. Dr David White, an immunologist and lecturer in clinical surgery at Cambridge University in UK, has discovered a way of transferring human genes to pigs, to breed hearts on demand. A breakthrough has come in isolating and engineering the gene responsible …
