Reply affidavit on behalf of the Central Ground Water Board in the matter of Suo Moto case titled "Haryana 60.48% groundwater over exploited Kurukshetra worst Jhajjar best says" appearing in the Tribune, January 8, 2025. The CGWA report, May 3, 2025 addresses the issue of groundwater exploitation and violation of …
THE future of nuclear pow~r worldwide appearS to be hanging in balance. Its prospects looked rosy 20 years ago when steep rise in oil prices compelled the Western nations to face the dreadful possibility of a serious and lasting energy shortage. Yet at that time, nuclear energy was not being …
With funds for mega accelerator projects drying up, particle physicists are increasingly turning their attention heavenwards. A 15-institution collaboration at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center in US has proposed a US $100 million gamma ray telescope -Gamma Large Array Space Telescope (GLAST) - to be put into space by AD 2005. …
'THE pie in the sky' is no longer miles too high. The keck Telescope, the world's biggest optical telescope, is helping astronomers achieve what they had always dreamt of doing - probing the spectra of extremely distant, and hence faint, objects in space. The main telescope is operated by a …
German researchers from the Fraunhofer Institute For Ceramic Technologies, have developed a 'hot moulding' technique for moulding thermoplastics. According to the scientists, this technology is simpler and cheaper than injection mould- ing. The technique involves mixing ceramic powder with waxes and paraffins that melt at low temperatures. The concoction is …
MOLECULAR magnetism, which involves designing and synthesising molecules that have properties like long-range magnetic ordering, is one of the most fascinating fields of research in material science. Many materials with this pro~ perty, useful in items like magnetic memory devices, !)ave been synthesised. But all of them suffer from the …
SCENES of starvation in the African, countries are a common feature and a subject of constant world attention. Often, aid and food have been rushed to these countries to stave off the hunger crisis. But help seems to be literally at hand, in their own backyards, asia recent study of …
WITH yet another, oil spill, this time off the coast of south Wales in the UK, the world's oceans may soon contain more oil rather than water! The recent Oil spill occured when an oil tanker - Sea Empress - ran aground ds it was enter- ing the estuary at …
INTERNET, the world's communication network will soon becorne the source for crofters - tenants in Scotland holding small plots of arable land near their homes - to access information al;6ut the ecological impact of fanning a4iions on their land. "We would like to explore @o what extent computer technology @ould …
A THREE-YEAR study conducted by the World Wide Fund for Nature-International for the Environment Protection Agency (EPA) reveals that sea birds inhabiting the Midway Islands in the,north Pacific have concentrations of persistant organic pollutants ajhigh as those in the birds found around the shores of the Great Lakes, North America …
Elephants in Thailand were recently treated to a jumbo feast at the Elephant Conservation Centre in Lampang, 535 km north of Bangkok. It was an elephantine version of the Thai tradition of Thai khan toke, a meal at which diners share food from a common bowl. They gorged on more …
AN IRRIGATION system that reduces water consumption, increases yield and eliminates dependency on rainfall, is nothing short of a boon for farmers. A novel method of crop irrigation - surge irrigation - incorporating these features, is currently under trial on the experimental farms of Tamil Nadu University of Agriculture in …
For two centuries, an unusual bird had been kept in wrong company. The hoatzin of South America, the only bird species to have a ruminant digestive system like a cow, was placed in the order Galliformes which includes pheasants, chickens and other birds with heavy bodies. However, a group of …
The day may not be far when people with balding pates will have a permanent solution to their problem. Bradford University (UK) researchers have isolated hair cells from balding pates for the first time. (Spectrum, November-December 1995, No 249). The research involves comparing test-tube cultures of cells from balding and …
The disposal of chrome-sludge continues to pose an environmental challenge. A tripartite collaboration between the Central Leather Research Institute in Madras, Regional Research Laboratory in Trivandrum and the TNO Institute of Applied Physics-Eindhoven in The Netherlands, has led to a major breakthrough in chrome-sludge utilisation for converting it into coloured …
THE entire DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) content in a cell can be compared to a book containing instructions for making the plant or animal of which that cell is a part. The four bases that make up the DNA code - A, T, G and c - are like the letters …
Resentment simmers in 27 villages near Gopalpur-on-Sea, Orissa, where the Tata Iron and Steel Company proposes to set up a steel plant on 290 ha of fertile land. Villagers clarify that they are opposed to the ousting of people from fertile lands supporting cashew) coconut and other fruit trees, and …
AGRICULTURE all over the world has suffered many aid cuts in the recent past, according to the director general of the um Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Jacques Diouf This has led to the world grain stocks plummetting to their lowest level in 20 years and a concomitant increase in …
RISING temperatures have left an indelible mark on the frozen continent - 8,000 sq km of ice sheets hundreds of metres thick have been lost in the past 50 years - as the mercury in this region has climbed by 2.5
A STUDY conducted by British researchers concluded that with rising mercury levels, temperate farmlands face a potential threat in the form of insecticide-resistant aphids (insects of the Homopteran order, which live on plant juices). The aphid population had till date been kept under check due to winter frost, but when …
Famine and mass starvation are looming large over the nation's 22 million inhabitants. Nearly 2.1 million children and half a million pregnant women across the country are at risk of malnutrition. Food supply for coal miners and others doing heavy work has been cut into half. Medical services across the …
