Although spending on science has risen worldwide, greater investment is needed in the face of growing crises, the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has recommended in a new report published. The latest edition of its Science Report, which is published every five years, further reveals that there is …
Kansas Board of Education in the us state of Kansas has redefined the origin of life. The board ruled that science classes in public schools should teach Intelligent Design (id), which casts doubts on Darwin's theory of evolution. id advocates that the universe is too complex to have evolved and …
IT'S BEEN four months since the Union ministry of environment and forest (MoEF), on behalf of the Supreme Court Monitoring Committee (SCMC) on Hazardous Wastes, sent a strongly worded letter to the chief secretaries of all states and Union territories in India. Referring to the Supreme Court (SC) order dated …
In the second week of June 2005, walls all over Italy were plastered with: "Life cannot be put to test. Don't vote'. The exhortations came from the Catholic clergy, which asked Italians to shun a referendum to repeal their country's law 40: a law banning embryonic stem cell research and …
Cryosat, a sattelite of the European Space Agency (esa), plumetted north of Greenland close to the region of the Lincoln Sea near North Pole, with no consequences to populated areas. The us $168 million worth satellite took off from Russia's Plesetsk Cosmodrome, aboard a modified intercontinental ballistic missile, Rockot. It …
the much awaited report on India's scientific prowess is finally out. The two-year, Rs 2.5 crore effort finds very little to write positively about a country that calls itself a potential knowledge superpower and has begun to bandy about its
brain wave: A team of Swiss neuroscientists and computer engineers are trying to program a computer to create a brain. In collaboration with IBM, the scientists are building a computer model of the neocortical column of a rat. They are trying to put together a single circuit of about 10,000 …
a team of researchers at the Queen's University in Belfast, Ireland, is training human-made molecules to act as tiny computers. These specially-synthesised molecules that can act as nanoscale light sensors or molecular transistors (analogous to 2-way switches) can revolutionise medicine, industry and information technology. Sri Lanka-born organic chemist Amilra de …
forthe first time, two unrelated clones of a wild species have bred naturally. Eight wildcat kittens were recently produced in two litters at Audubon Centre for Research of Endangered Species (acres), Audubon Nature Institute, New Orleans, the us, by crossbreeding cloned adults: two mothers Madge and Caty (cloned from female …
Harvest order: The Supreme Court recently issued notices to the Union and the state governments, urging them to conserve rainwater. The move came in response to a petition filed by Tap-Rejuvenate Earth's Ecology and Environment, a non-governmental organisation. The petition sought rooftop rainwater harvesting structures over 200 square metres in …
Rekindling the debate over the interference of politics in scientific research, the us National Academy of Sciences (nas) disregarded the caution of the us Health and Human Services Department (hhsd) and published a report on June 28, 2005, on the possibilities of the country's milk supply being poisoned by botulinum …
a new study could drastically change our understanding of how diseases are passed from one generation to the next. Conducted by the Washington State University, Pullman, usa, it offers a fantastic explanation obviating genetics. The researchers, led by M K Skinner, injected pregnant rats with two common chemicals
Theus stringently monitors scientific practice and even has an Office of Research Integrity to track adherence to scientific ethics. Yet, a third of practising American scientists indulge in malpractices in their work . This was revealed in a study conducted among 3,200 us scientists by the not-for-profit HealthPartners Research Foundation, …
fishy plant: A team of Australian scientists has created a plant that yields the highly beneficial long-chain omega-3 fatty acids usually found in fish oil. Allan Green of CSIRO, an Australian research organisation in Canberra, and his team have developed a type of thale cress (Arabidopsis thaliana) by inserting genes …
a team of us astronomers has found a planet that most closely resembles the Earth from among the 150 discovered so far outside our solar system. About 7.5 times as massive as the Earth, the new planet, possibly rocky, is located just 15 light years away from us. It travels …
The controversy around embryonic stem cell research has resurfaced in the us, this time pitting president George W Bush against many other Republican leaders. The us house of representatives passed a bill on May 24, 2005, allowing public funding for such research through the National Institutes of Health (nih), under …
harnessing Space for rural enlightenment was an avowed goal of the Indian space programme. It was crystal clear to Vikram Sarabhai, the chief architect of the Space programme: conquering Space was not fancy science, but one aligned with the national goal of improving the lot of millions. In the ensuing …
When Max Plank embarked upon the study of physics in the early 20 th century, his first lesson was that that there was nothing new to be unearthed in physics; Newton had already discovered the only universe in existence. But then, along came Einstein and replaced it with his own. …
