Science and Technology

India and US agreed for Future Cooperation in Moon and Mars Missions

India and the US in the Month of March 2013 agreed for cooperation on future missions to the Moon and Mars after successful collaboration inChandrayaan-1 lunar mission. The highly successful Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission which was launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) in October 2008 led to strong evidence of the presence of lunar water. So, In light of the Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission NASA and ISRO agreed to explore further cooperative space exploration work, including future missions to the Moon and Mars. The scientist from both the working group of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and National Aeronautical and Space Administration (NASA) agreed to continue discussions in planetary science and Heliophysics to identify areas of potential cooperation. The value of mutual cooperation was well reflected, it can be supported from the fact that with the addition of two NASA instruments on the successful Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission, led to significant discoveries about lunar surface characteristics. The existing cooperation, in the use of US and Indian earth observation satellite data, helped in producing information yielding a broad range of societal benefits including improved weather and monsoon forecasting, disaster management and response, improved agricultural and natural resource use and better understanding of climate change.

Researchers Found Gene Mutation Associated With Fatal Prostate Cancer

Researchers at the Institute of Cancer Research in London and the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust revealed that men suffering from prostate cancer and the inherited gene mutation have worst kinds of ailments. The gene called BRCA2 is associated with hereditary breast cancer and also the ovarian and prostate cancer. Researchers revealed that men having BRCA2 gene are more prone to prostate cancer and it was also revealed that they are likely to have an aggressive form of tumour with poor survival rates. Men like these needed immediate treatment for survival. It was also revealed that one out of 100 men suffering from prostate cancer might have BRCA2 mutation. For men like these, immediate radiotherapy or surgery can work, even in the cases where the disease is in its infancy.
About Prostate Cancer

·         Prostate Cancer is a men-typical ailment which is very difficult to predict at the early stage.

·         The disease grows at a very slow or very fast pace.

·         It is difficult to detect Prostate Cancer because a lot of men can live with the disease without showing any signs of this disease.

·         Over 40000 men are diagnosed with prostate cancer on an yearly basis.

·         For a lot of men suffering from Prostate Cancer, treatment is not required immediately. However, researchers revealed that men, who have BRCA2 gene along with prostate cancer, should be treated immediately because in their case tumour spreads at a faster pace.

Prof Ros Eeles and his colleagues at The Institute of Cancer Research in London and The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust revealed that men with BRCA2 gene should be treated faster because of the greater degree of fatality. In the research, records of these prostate cancer patients were studied. 61 men having BRCA2 gene and 18 men having BRCA1 gene mutation along with 1940 men with none of these mutations were studied. It was clear after the study that men with BRCA2-mutations had less survival chances. These men lived an average of 6.5 years after the diagnosis in comparison to 12.9 years for the non-carriers of this mutation. It is worth noticing that people who have a family history of ovarian or breast cancer along with prostate cancer can go for BRCA1/2 testing at diagnosis. Nevertheless, this testing is not offered to all the patients diagnosed with prostate cancer in UK.

US Government launched a New Research Initiative Called BRAIN

US government on 3 April 2013 announced a new research initiative called Brain (Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies) which is designed to revolutionise the understanding of the human brain. Launched with approximately 100 million US dollars in the President’s Fiscal Year 2014 Budget, the BRAIN initiative ultimately aims to help researchers find new ways to treat, cure, and even prevent brain disorders, such as Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, and traumatic brain injury. The BRAIN Initiative will accelerate the development and application of new technologies that will enable researchers to produce dynamic pictures of the brain that show how individual brain cells and complex neural circuits interact at the speed of thought. The scientists possess the capability to study individual neurons and figure out the main functions of certain areas of the brain, but a human brain contains almost a hundred billion neurons making trillions of connections.

Hobbit Humans Had Larger Brains Than Estimated: Research

Hobbit Humans, who are said to be the tiny creatures living on remote Indonesian island of Flores till around 12000 years ago, had larger brains than thought, as per the recent research conducted by National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo. This research also strengthened the fact that hobbits evolved from the ancestors Homo erectus. Homo erectus, are said to have evolved into our species in Africa. The study revealed that environment as well as location could have created the difference between the individual who looked similar to us, and someone who looked familiar to hobbit. The Hobbit Humans were extremely short in height (3’6") and they had relatively shorter legs in comparison to their feet and arms. Kaifu, a senior researcher at the National Museum of Nature and Science in Tokyo who conducted the study along with lead author Daisuke Kubo and Reiko Kono, made use of high-resolution micro-CT scanning in order to study about the brain regions of hobbit human skulls. In the scans, it was found out that the brains measured 426 cc in comparison to estimated 400 cc. 426 cc is just around the same size like the brain of a chimpanzee. However, this study indicated that the difference meant it was possible for the Homo erectus to have evolved from the brains like these. The researchers indicated towards the fact that Homo erectus who lived on the mainland, moved to the isolated islands of Flores. The unique evolution of the Hobbits suggested that once they got on the island, they did not move out. The researchers explained that according to the theory, big mammals decrease and small mammals increase in their body sizes on the isolated island due to energetic demands. Dean Falk, the team of whom estimated that Hobbit’s brain were smaller, explained that the new measurements were the most precise ones available till date. This is so because these measurements were done with great care and improved and advanced methods.

Heaviest Rocket Launch in 2014: ISRO

India’s heaviest rocket ever is expected to take to the sky next January on an experimental flight whose later versions could be used to send humans on space missions. The mainstay of the Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle —Mark III (GSLV-Mk III) would be to put in orbit communication satellites weighing between four and five tonnes, thus packing more transponders per launch. “We are targeting an experimental flight of GSLV-Mk III in January 2014,” Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) Chairman K. Radhakrishnan told reporters after a public lecture at the Indian National Science Academy (INSA) here. This will also be a first time that ISRO scientists would undertake an experimental flight of a launch vehicle which would fall into the sea after reaching a height of 120 km. “We have been simulating the flight using computers. But there are certain tests that cannot be carried out on the ground. We will test the rocket in a cost effective manner,” GSLV-Mk III’s project director S. Somnath said.
He said ISRO engineers have planned to take some 2,000 measurements during the experimental flight of the GSLV-Mk III, which would weigh 640 tonnes at lift-off, making it the heaviest rocket built in the country. “All the 2000 measurements during the flight would be telemetred down to the ground station. We will analyse them. This will enable us to have full knowledge of the flight,” Somnath said. The new rocket, which can put a four tonne satellite in orbit, will help Antrix Corporation, ISRO’s commercial arm, to offer cheapest space launches in the niche market.

High Level Working Group Presented Report on Western Ghats to MoEF

The 10-member High Level Working Group (HLWG) headed by K Kasturirangan presented report on Western Ghats to Ministry of Environment and Forests on 17 April 2013. It proposed to protect 90 percent of the region’s Natural Landscape as Ecological Sensitive Area. The HLWG report draws upon the basic framework suggested by WGEEP to use remote sensing technologies to demarcate the ecologically sensitive areas of the Western Ghats but with two key differences. First it used satellite data, down to 24 m resolution, as against 9 km used by WGEEP. This finer resolution, was possible because of the collaboration with NRSC/ISRO, which used datasets to distinguish vegetation types over the landscape of the entire Western Ghats. Second it distinguishes between the cultural and the natural landscape of the region. Using remote sensing technology, it has found that the cultural landscape – which includes human settlements, agricultural fields and plantations — covers 58.44 per cent of the region. The natural landscape ranges over the remaining 41.56 per cent. The methodology adopted by NRSC/ISRO has then combined spatial information generated on vegetation types with species level information; biological richness and disturbance regimes – to identify the biologically diverse and contiguous regions of the Western Ghats. Its conclusion, based on this methodology, is that roughly 37 per cent of the total area defined as the boundary of the Western Ghats is ecologically sensitive. Over this area of some 60000 sq km, spread over the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, the HLWG has recommended a prohibitory regime on those activities with maximum interventionist and destructive impact on the environment.
The Working Group makes a range of recommendations to incentivize green growth in the Western Ghats. These include managing forests and improving their productivity to ensure inclusive growth and economic benefits for local communities; integrating forest accounts into state and national economic assessments; initiating an ecosystem service fund to help villages around the forests; promoting sustainable agriculture and; encouraging ecotourism for local benefits. As part of the governance of ecologically sensitive areas, the Working Group has proposed to set up a Decision Support and Monitoring Centre for Geospatial Analysis and Policy Support in the Western Ghats, which will monitor changes and advise state government on policy reform. But it has made it clear that all these reports must be in the public domain. It has also recommended that the high-resolution map, which demarcates ecologically sensitive areas, down to each village settlement, must be put in the public domain so that people can be involved in taking decisions about environment, which is first and foremost their concern. The report notes that environmentally sound development cannot preclude livelihood and economic options for this region… the answer (to the question of how to manage and conserve the Ghats) will not lie in removing these economic options, but in providing better incentives to move them towards greener and more sustainable practices. In doing this, the Working Group has moved away from the suggestions of the Expert Panel, which had recommended a blanket approach consisting of guidelines for sector-wise activities, which would be permitted in the ecologically sensitive zones. The Working Group was constituted by the ministry to advise the Government on the recommendations of an earlier report – that of the eminent ecologist Madhav Gadgil-led Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel (WGEEP). The WGEEP had recommended that the entire Western Ghats should be declared as an ecologically sensitive area; had suggested three levels of categorization where regulatory measures for protection would be imposed and had recommended the establishment of the Western Ghats Ecology Authority for management. In August 2012, MoEF constituted the High Level Working Group (HLWG) to examine the large numbers of public responses received to the recommendations of the Gadgil report and to suggest the way ahead.

Sea Ice of Antarctica Increasing Despite Warming Global Climate: Study

A team of scientists from the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI) in De Bilt explained in their recent study that the reason for expansion of sea ice of Antarctica is climate change. This phenomenon may be caused because of cold plumes of fresh water which is derived because of melting that happens beneath the Antarctic ice shelves. The melted water has comparatively low density which is why it accumulates in top layer of ocean. Cool surface water thereafter re-freezes easily during the Winter and the Autumn. This phenomenon explains why there is an increase in the level of sea ice of Antarctica during these particular seasons. Climate scientists observed that Antarctic sea ice displayed a slight but statistically crucial increase of around 1.9 percent per decade ever since 1985. On the contrary, level of sea ice in Arctic has been continuously shrinking over past few decades. These observed changes were tried to be reproduced in the computer-based climate model. The lead author of the study, Richard Bintanja explained that sea ice around the Antarctica has been increasing inspite of an increase in the global temperature.

Researchers Successfully Transplanted a Bio-Engineered Kidney in Rat

The researchers from Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, United States on 14 April 2013 announced that they had bio-engineered a kidney that can be marked a step-ahead in the quest to help patients suffering from Kidney Failure. The researchers as an experiment transplanted the bio-engineered kidney into rats and discovered that the experiment was successful. The success of the experiment has laid a way for building replacement structures of lungs, livers and hearts. The process of kidney transplant into the rat involved taking out a rat kidney and stripping out its living cells by using a solution made of detergent and leave behind a shell made of collagen. Further, the rats’ empty structure with living cells was repopulated that comprised human endothelial cells that lined the walls of kidney blood vessels and kidney cells taken from newborn rat. Then the cells were seeded in the correct part of the kidney with the help of a muscle duct that is called ureter as a tube and then transplanted the organ into the living rat from which the kidney was removed. The result of the experiment was that the new kidney started filtering the blood and produced urine as soon as the blood supply was restored. The results of the experiment had brought human being a step-closer to create lab grown organs for humans. The team of researchers was led by Harald Ott.

Saving Australia’s marine biodiversity

Last year the Australian Government unveiled plans for marine protected areas girding the continent. The plans became official in November. Parliament approval is expected shortly. Australia will spend tens of millions of dollars on the programme. It will protect 2.3 million sq. km of sea and try to balance leisure uses, commercial interests such as fishing and drilling, and conservation. The move was hailed as a first step towards seriously addressing the loss of biodiversity in the waters off the Australian continent. Some areas come under total protection like the Great Barrier Reef and the Coral Sea but there are many areas, which are only partially protected. A significant aspect of the government’s move is that in many areas, greater protection is mandated in deeper waters while the shallow (coastal) water is left unprotected. This could probably be because some areas have big oil reserves. What effect will the drilling for oil and gas have on species in the areas drilled? “It varies from high levels of underwater noise from seismic activity which can disturb animals like whales, to a possible major accident like the Montara incident of the Northwest a few years ago, or the Gulf of Mexico,” Mr. Paul Gamblin, Marine Policy Manager, WWF-Australia, said in an email to this correspondent.
Protecting a proportion of all marine habitats is the best way forward. For instance, protecting coral reefs has great benefits. And leading scientists recommend this. Aside from reefs, seagrass, underwater canyons and upwellings are other areas. “This also means protecting important areas for wildlife species to shelter, feed and breed,” he notes. There are threatened species that are found in Australian waters, many that face threats when they migrate beyond Australian waters, too. Mr. Gamblin says: “Marine parks should help in the recovery of these species but they do not have to be designed around specific threats or the particular threatened species, but to protect a representative sample of the ecosystem. That helps restore the health of the marine habitat and withstand pressures like those from fishing and climate change.”

Nuclear Capable Agni-II Missile was Successfully Test-Fired

The medium range nuclear capable Agni-II missile was on 7 April 2013 successfully test-fired with a strike range of more than 2000 km from the Wheeler Island off Odisha coast. The two-stage missile equipped with advanced high accuracy navigation system, guided by a novel scheme of state of the earth command and control system was propelled by solid rocket propellant system. The 20-metre long Agni-II is a two-stage, solid-propelled ballistic missile. It has a launch weight of 17 tonnes and can carry a payload of 1000 kg over a distance of 2000 km. The state-of-the-art Agni-II missile was developed by Advanced Systems Laboratory (ASL) and integrated by the Bharat Dynamics Limited (BDL), Hyderabad. Agni-II is part of the Agni series of missiles developed by DRDO which includes Agni-I with a 700 km range, Agni-III with a 3000 km range, Agni-IV with 4000 km range and Agni-V more than 5000 km range.

Italian Archeologists Discovered the Gate to Hell from Ruins in Turkey

Italian archeologists in the first week of April 2013, discovered the gate to hell from ruins in Turkey. The research conducted by the team led by Francesco D’Andria, professor of classic archaeology at the University of Salento found out that there existed a gate to hell, also called Pluto’s Gate-Ploutonion in Greek and Plutonium in Latin. The gate to hell was known to be the gateway to underworld in Greco-Roman mythology as well as tradition. Historically, this site was situated in ancient Phrygian city of Hierapolis, which is now called Pamukkale. It was described by the historians that the opening of this gate to hell was filled with lethal mephitic vapors. Greek geographer Strabo (64/63 BC-about 24 AD) described that this place was filled with dense and misty vapours and the animals which passed through it, died instantly. The results of the findings were described at the conference on Italian archaeology in Istanbul, Turkey.
Francesco D’Andria, the lead archaeologist described that the gate to hell was discovered by reconstruction of the route of thermal spring. Pamukkale’ springs, which are said to produce white travertine terraces originated from this cave only. The site had even more ruins that earlier. The archaeologists found out Ionic semi columns. On their top, was the inscription with dedication to deities of the underworld-Pluto and Kore. The ruins of the temple, a pool as well as certain steps placed above the cave were also found and they all matched the descriptions of the site described in ancient sources. Francesco D’Andria also described that this site was a renowned destination for performing the rites of incubation. The pilgrims used to take the waters in pool near the temple and slept close to the cave to receive prophecies and visions, in a kind of Delphi effect. The team of archeologists is now in the process of digital reconstruction of this site.

Supreme Court of India Ordered Relocation of Endangered Asiatic Lions from Gujarat to MP

A bench led by Justice K S Radhakrishnan of the Supreme Court of India on 15 April 2013 ordered Gujarat to share the endangered Asiatic lions with its neighbouring state- Madhya Pradesh. The population of these Asiatic lions has almost become negligible but because of certain conservation efforts in the state of Gujarat in past 50 years, these endangered lions have been saved from extinction. At present, the population of these lions in Gir forests of Gujarat is 400. The political leaders in Gujarat resisted relocation of these lions, but Supreme Court ordered that they should be relocated in order to save them from elimination because of fire or epidemic.
Conversationalists too had recommended establishment of second sanctuary outside Gujarat in order to make sure about genetic diversification. Back in 1986, the Union Government decided to relocate some of the Asiatic lions from Gir forest in Gujarat to Kuno game sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh in order to prevent extinction of these species. Gujarat had earlier opposed Madhya Pradesh’s appeal for relocation of these lions on the grounds of poor record of protection of tiger population in Panna reserve forest. What number of Asiatic lions should be moved to Kuno game sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh is yet to be determined.