Two researchers from Tamil Nadu have spotted a rare moth species, Mimeusemia cylonica for the first time in India in the buffer zone of the Kalakkad–Mundanthurai Tiger Reserve (KMTR) after it was last sighted 127 years ago — at Trincomalee in Sri Lanka in 1893. Mimeusemia ceylonica is a moth of the …
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GOLDEN CITY GATE TOURISM AWARDS 2023
India Bags Golden & Silver Star at The International ‘Golden City Gate Tourism Awards 2023 at ITB, Berlin 2023. The Golden City Gate Tourism Multi-media Awards are given annually in various categories related to the Tourism and Hospitality sectors. The ‘Golden City Gate’ is a creative multi-media international competition for countries, cities, regions and hotels. The Golden City Gate is the creative and innovative expression of …
Read More »MULTI-ANGLE IMAGER FOR AEROSOLS
NASA announced that it is partnering with the Italian Space Agency ASI (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana) to build and launch MAIA, or the Multi-Angle Imager for Aerosols missions. The joint mission will investigate the health impacts of air pollution in the world’s most populated cities. MAIA will make radiometric and polarimetric measurements needed to characterize the sizes, compositions and quantities of particulate matter in air …
Read More »KODAIKANAL SOLAR OBSERVATORY
For well over a century, the Kodaikanal Solar Observatory (KoSO) has been observing the Sun, capturing images of sunspots, and recording changes in its behaviour. KoSO is owned and operated by Indian Institute of Astrophysics. It is one of the world’s oldest observatories studying the Sun. The idea was first proposed by the astronomer Norman Pogson, …
Read More »PROMOTING BORDER TOURISM
Last December, Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan spoke of the need “to repopulate vast unoccupied areas, located even far away from the last villages of the state towards the border” and emphasised the importance of promoting border tourism in such areas. The Government of India has made unprecedented …
Read More »ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND JOB DISPLACEMENTS
AI is the digital distillation of a technological revolution that is facilitating the long-overdue evolution of the human mind. AI, as fear-inducing as anything disruptive and new is, can trigger new avenues of intelligence in human minds. These new avenues enable us to understand and attack society’s greatest challenges today. …
Read More »BUDGET 2023 IS A CASE OF EDUCATION TAKING A HIT
The allocation made for education in the Union Budget 2023 reminds a person of these lines from the Samuel Taylor Coleridge poem, “Work without Hope”: “Work without Hope draws nectar in a sieve, And Hope without an object cannot live. ” However, the news headlines shouted out a different story: …
Read More »NASA HANDS OVER NISAR SATELLITE TO ISRO
The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has received the NASA-ISRO SAR (NISAR) satellite from the U.S. space agency. NISAR is a Low Earth Orbit observatory jointly developed by NASA and ISRO. According to ISRO, NISAR will map the entire globe in 12 days and provide spatially and temporally consistent data …
Read More »MONEY LAUNDERING LAWS WILL NOW COVER CRYPTOCURRENCY TRADE
India’s money laundering laws will apply to trade in cryptocurrencies, the Finance Ministry said in a notification dated March 7. The exchange between virtual digital assets and fiat currencies, the exchange between one or more forms of virtual digital assets and the transfer of digital assets will be covered under …
Read More »CLIMATE CHANGE, GLACIER TOPOGRAPHY & MORPHOLOGY CONTROL GLACIAL RETREAT
Change in debris cover plays a critical role in the glacier surface lowering, shrinkage, retreat, and mass balance, according to a recent study. Therefore, these factors need to be accounted for in future studies for a complete understanding of the observed glacier changes and responses. Despite the importance of the …
Read More »MARINE BIODIVERSITY OF AREAS BEYOND NATIONAL JURISDICTION
Last week, the UN member states agreed on a historic treaty for protecting marine life in international waters that lie outside the jurisdiction of any country. The ‘breakthrough’ followed talks led by the UN during the Intergovernmental Conference (IGC) on Marine Biodiversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction (BBNJ) where negotiations …
Read More »THE IMPORTANCE OF WOMEN-LED DIGITAL SOLUTIONS
The theme for International Women’s Day 2023 is ‘DigitALL: Innovation and Technology for Gender Equality.’ The transformational and all-encompassing role of digital technology is growing even faster in the post-pandemic world. But sadly, the digital revolution also poses the challenge of perpetuating gender inequality, which is increasingly noticeable in the …
Read More »CHATBOT GAFFES THAT EXPOSE THE CHINKS IN THE AI ARMOUR
That OpenAI’s ChatGPT has received a lot of attention is well known by now. Recently, two journalists from the United States polling company, FiveThirtyEight, asked the artificial intelligence chatbot to create an 800-word piece regarding public perception of AI chatbots. “A 2021 survey by the Pew Research Center,” the chatbot …
Read More »BIO-COMPUTERS
Scientists at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) recently outlined a plan for a potentially revolutionary new area of research called organoid intelligence, which aims to create “bio-computers”. Organoid intelligence is an emerging interdisciplinary scientific field aiming to establish a new type of biological computing system. These next-generation biocomputers will harness the computational power of the …
Read More »RAILWAYS TIES UP WITH ISRO FOR TRAIN TRACKING
The Indian Railways is harnessing the power of data analytics for integrated transportation. It has commenced a project which will now enable real time tracking of train movements with the assistance of satellite imagery under the Real Time Train Information System (RTIS) project. K. Singh, Managing Director, Centre for Railway …
Read More »OLIVE RIDLEYS
Nearly 6.37 lakh Olive Ridley turtles have arrived for mass nesting on the Rushikulya coast this year, setting a new record for the beach in Ganjam district of Odisha. The arrival of the turtles for laying eggs from February 23 to March 2 — which is treated as the mass …
Read More »GREEN HYDROGEN SUPERPOWER
India has committed to 50% electricity capacity from non-fossil sources by 2030. But an energy transition in industry is needed at the same time. Most industrial greenhouse gas emissions in India come from steel, cement, fertilizers and petrochemicals. Green hydrogen holds the promise of fuelling industrial growth while simultaneously reducing …
Read More »DODGY AND CONFLICT WOOD
Recent investigation by International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) revealed that India has become the second largest importer of “conflict wood” from Myanmar, after China. India hasn’t banned the import of teak from Myanmar, which is being exported to the US & EU. These supplies of teak not only chip away at the Myanmar’s …
Read More »HALLMARK UNIQUE IDENTIFICATION (HIUD) NUMBER
The sale of gold jewellery will not be allowed without a Hallmark Unique Identification (HUID) number. HUID number is a six-digit alphanumeric code. It is given to every piece of jewellery at the time of hallmarking. It is a unique identifier for each gold item. The jewellery is stamped with the unique number manually at the Assaying & Hallmarking centre. Features: …
Read More »INDEX FUNDS
Global index providers are reviewing some of the stocks’ inclusion in its indices that are replicated by many foreign portfolio managers after the Hindenburg report. Index funds An index fund is a portfolio of stocks or bonds designed to mimic the composition and performance of a financial market index. Index funds have lower expenses and fees than …
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