Good Food is First Food. It is not junk food. It is the food that connects nature and nutrition with livelihoods. This food is good for our health; it comes from the rich biodiversity of our regions; it provides employment to people. Most importantly, cooking and eating give us pleasure. …
perceptions, motivations, deductions and choices. These seem simple enough for us. After all, making thousands of choices everyday, taking numerous decisions - important or insignificant - do not appear difficult to us. But what comes easily to the human mind can become exceedingly difficult for technology to replicate. A robot, …
since the days of the magnetic or paper tape, data-storage technology has come long way. Magnetic disks, compact discs and now, even optical storage is fast becoming a reality. Of these, hologra-phic memory appears the most promising way to store huge amounts of data. With ultra-high storage densities, faster data …
after basmati rice, it is the chickpea's turn. Western companies have made yet another attempt to put their brand names on a crop that Indian farmers have grown for generations. Last year, Rice-Tech, a us -based company, after hijacking the "basmati" name - their rice was artfully christened "Texmati" - …
Low-tar, filter-tipped cigarettes have only increased the incidence of adenocarcinomas, a cancer occurring deep inside the lungs. According to the American Cancer Society, only non-filtered cigarettes were linked to lung cancers so far. But data on the disease reveal that adenocarcinomas, never linked to smoking earlier, was rising in those …
if the most dangerous substances in our food would have to be listed, sugar and fat would be in the top five. Many, therefore, keep a sharp watch on the quantities of both in their diet. Sugar-free drinks, chewing gums with "low-calorie," "fat-free" tags, therefore, enjoy widespread popularity. All such …
US Navy will modify its Quickstrike naval mines so that they can disable enemy mines and clear a safe passage for its ships. The mine is usually dropped from a fighter aircraft. As it falls, air pressure and impact with the water arm the warhead, causing it to detonate when …
Rapid rise in the number of visitors at the National Audubon Society's Corkscrew Swamp Sanctuary, southwest of Florida, USA, has resulted in an alarming increase in the amount of waste generated. But the sanctuary, in consonance with laws of Florida, has built a comprehensive sewage system to treat the wastes. …
following recent reports of emission of dioxins from iron and steel plants in Europe, federal environmental agencies in usa and Canada are planning to launch a bilateral effort to probe dioxin emissions from such plants. Dioxins are carcinogens that are emitted when certain highly-chlorinated compounds are burned. Some recent European …
polymers that turn ultraviolet (uv) light into visible light could be used for everything from advertising to protecting plants from damage as the ozone layer thins. Researcher Rudi Danz from the Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Polymer Research in Teltow, usa, has developed polymers that contain napthalene groups, which excited by …
each visual scene that we look at is highly detailed and composed of numerous elements. Though we can usually appreciate a scene as a whole, our eyes continue to move from one element of the scene, or a "target,' to another. These movements are called saccades or saccadic movements and …
The Comdex computer show at Las Vegas, USA, marked the end of the conventional 3-5 inch floppies when Sony and Panasonic unveiled their plans for rival high capacity drives and discs. Sony's High-Capacity 200-megabyte (MB) Floppy Disc has tracks just 9 micrometers wide and spins at 3600 revolutions per minute. …
Scientists have known for years that leaves falling from trees and flowing downstream are important to the ecosystem of the waterbody. Now, researchers at the University of Georgia and Virginia Polytech have come out with the results of a three-year study that further explain the functions of fallen leaves. The …
A California state jury has directed the owner of a tanker that spilled 76.4 million litres of oil in 1990 near two popular beaches in the US state to pay US $18 million for damages caused by the closing of the beaches. In what lawyers called an unprecedented verdict, the …
as the clock struck midnight on December 31, smokers in Californian bars were denied the pleasure of a New Year's Eve smoke as the anti-smoking laws were enforced in all 35, 596 bars currently operating in the state. Beginning January 1, all smokers will have to stub out their cigarettes …
after years of concealment from the public, the us administration revealed a small, lightweight nuclear device that was to be delivered to an enemy harbour using a navy or Marine parachutist. The information, along with 270,000 pages of materials kept secret for the last 50 years, was made public recently …
The sudden climate shift at the end of the Palaeocene era 55 million years ago might be a result of volcanic eruptions. According to Timothy Bralower at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, USA, volcanic eruptions released sulphur into the stratosphere. These clouds of sulphate particles formed aerosols that …
after the successful launch of Earlybird 1, the first commercial spy satellite, anyone can now acquire high resolution images taken from space for as little as us $300. It's getting popular everyday and the maker of the satellite, Earthwatch Inc, even has its own website on the Internet (www.digitaglobe.com) where …
around 1200 bce, the Bronze Age civilisations of the Eastern Mediterranean came to a premature end . Within 50 years, several famous centres of scholarship and industry such as Troy, Mycenae and Knossos had been reduced to rubble. Amos Nur, a geophysicist at Stanford University, usa , believes that a …
DANISH FIRM IN INDIA: A S Velfrost, a US $200-million Danish freezer and deep freezer manufacturer, is considering India as a possible manufacturing base, its first outside Denmark. According to executives, a deal is being negotiated with Blue Star India for a joint venture. However, the plans have not taken …
