Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of In Re: News Item titled "Nayar river is vanishing - a yatra reveals conservation goes beyond science and policy" appearing in ‘The Down To Earth’ dated 03.06.2025. The original application was registered suo-motu based on the news item titled "Nayar …
Scientists of the University of Leicester, UK, have demonstrated an easy technique by which crushed seeds from the tropical tree Moringa oleifera (drumstick tree) can be used for cleaning contaminated streams. The technique is very effective and works out much cheaper than chemicals such as alum, used for the purpose. …
The process of cryo-recycling of plastic wastes has recently been developed by Harry Rosin, director of the Hygiene Institute in Dort- round, Germany. The method uses freezing rather than burning techniques for treating mixed plastic wastes. Wastes are frozen at temperatures as low as -160
A company in the US has developed a new rinsing agent known as advanced vapour degreasing (AVD). AVD, a zero-ozone depletion potential process, is used to clean electronic circuits, metal parts and high-performance components. Designed to improve cleaning capabilities, AVD can carry higher concentrations of contaminants, oils and flux residue …
IT WAS almost the last flight for passengers on board a commuter aircraft thattook off from Washington D C one nightin April last year. As the aircraft gainedheightthe pilot set its course for a shortflight to NewarkNew Jersey. Then suddenlythings went wonky. The air trafficcontrol radioed the pilot that the …
WHEN Mt Vesuvius erupted in Italy, the town of Pompeii vanished. All that was left behind were crusts of dried lava. For long, scientists have held that it is the run-off streams of lava from volcanic eruptions that kills thousands of people, sweeping away entire civilisations. But recent reports have …
The department of mechanical engineering at the Regional Engineering College in Kurukshetra, Haryana, has developed a portabJe aerator which combines the supply of air and the mixing of water ina single unit. It operates by directing surrounding air to the top of a marine propeller. The propeller agitates and efficiently …
Fire-fighting could cause other problems like flooding and electrical damage. In an effort to come up with a better fire extiriguisher,the US-based firm Charged Injection ofPrinceton,New Jersey, is developing a method to douse fires using an electrostatically-charged mist of water. The spray will inject a beam of charged electrons -fired …
SELECTING a mate is perhaps a daunting task, but is it really that complex? Lee Dugatkin, a behavi6ural ecologist at the University of Louisville, us, fixes up Trinidadian guppies on dates in aquariums and probes the sociobiology of these creatures. His study seeks to determine the criteria employed by female …
DYNAMOTIVE, a firm in Vancouver, Canada, has come with a path-breaking technology that utilises house- hold waste for removing noxious gases from the exhausts of coal-burning power plants. This technology could spread like wild-fire among the developed nations of the world (The Economist, Vol 339, No 7963). Going by statistics, …
William Foster of the Universityof Cambridge in Massachusetts, US, Witnessed a duel between horned aphids (Astegopteryx minuta), which is the first case of a fight over territory to be observed among insects. The difficulry in finding good feeding sites led to the strife. Their weapons were their horns - protrusions …
A fossilised jaw discovered last year in the Yuanqu river basin, in the southern part of China's Shanxi province is probably an early ancestor of the modern monkey, ape and even humans. Scientists at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh, US, and the Institute of Vertebrate Palaeontology and …
ALTHOUGH forms of life found on oceanic islands have their mainland cousins, they develop distinct identities for themselves. The uniqueness of these living beings is attributed to the changes that they undergo in order to adapt to the island environment. Scientists believe that such differences could not be chance occurrences …
THE main objective of the research con- ducted by P C Kotwal and Rajesh Gopal (officers involved with Project Tiger) was to observe the loyalty tigers felt towards their respective domains. The patterns of behaviour exhibited in the post-natal period were also under scrutiny. The experts conducted their research at …
Biologist Robert Wharton of the Desert Research Institute in Reno, Nevada, US, is convinced that there once existed life on the Mars, planet. For the past 17 years, Wharton has been melting holes into the surface of Antarctic glacial lakes and diving below in search of life in any form. …
In a pioneering effort, Vortoil Separation Systems Ltd of Gloucester, UK, has developed a hydro cyclone separator to remove oil from water. The hydrocyclone separator can convert the kinetic energy contained by flowing liquids into powerful centrifugal forces. This results in the instantaneous separation of oil and water. The vortex …
A bacterial colony was recently discovered 4,500 ft below the earth's surface, surviving apparently on only rock and water. The cluster was found in an aquifer near the river Columbia (close to the Hanford nuclear facility), in the state of Washington, US, by microbiologist Todd Stevens and geochemist James McKinley, …
FOR the past 10 years, a large number of moose are dying in southwest Sweden. The cause for this is acid rain. Acidification and the declining numbers of this warm-blooded animal are being linked because of a complex chain of events, arising from the occurrence of the former. According to …
THE anaconda - the world's largest snake - carries the notorious reputation in folklore of being a monstrous, man-eating reptile that exhumes poisonous gases. It is also known to hypnotise its human victims. The species (Eunectes murinus) is found throughout South America's Orinoco and Amazon river basins. Scientists are now …
More than 20 years have passed since the Vietnam war ended, but agent orange continues to live on. Agent orange is a highly poisonous herbicide, used as a defoliant for crops and forest cover. Although it was used by the Americans for just two years - to defoliate the jungles …
