Science & technology

ISRO to launch moon landing mission at 2.51 a.m. on Monday Chandrayaan-2, the first Indian moon landing mission, is all set to head on its 3.84 lakh km voyage to the moon in the wee hours of Monday, July 15. The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) has scheduled the launch …

A Tokyo-based cryptocurrency exchange said on Friday it had halted all services after losing cryptocurrency worth more than $32 million in the latest hack involving virtual money. Remixpoint said its subsidiary BITPoint Japan discovered overnight that about $32.3 million in various digital currencies had gone missing. The apparent hack was …

Includes 3 rovers, 6 U.S. flags, probes Three rovers, six U.S. flags, dozens of probes that either landed successfully or crashed, tools, cameras and trash: the Moon is dotted with hundreds of objects as a result of space exploration. Some experts are calling to grant them heritage status to protect …

Artificial intelligence programs have bested humans in checkers, chess, Go and two-player poker, but multi-player poker was always believed to be a bigger ask. Mission: accomplished. Researchers at Carnegie Mellon University, working with Facebook’s AI initiative, has announced that their program defeated a group of top pros in six-player no-limit …

Umpire wears an earpiece connected to iPhone and relays the call upon receiving it from a computer system “Robot umpires” have arrived. The independent Atlantic League became the first American professional baseball league to let a computer call balls and strikes on Wednesday night at its All-Star Game. Plate umpire …

Changes in soil characteristics affect organic elements, ruins of Viking settlements In Greenland, climate change isn’t just a danger to ecosystems but also a threat to history, as global warming is affecting archeological remains, according to a study. There are more than 1,80,000 archaeological sites across the Arctic, some dating …

Chandrayaan-2’s lander and rover were tested on a simulated surface Newly designed cars are tested for road-worthiness on terrain where they would be driven, while new aircraft are test-flown in the skies. But where on earth did the Chandrayaan-2 mission’s lander and rover, which will head for the moon on …

Greek find resets human migration clock A 2,10,000-year-old skull (image shows computer-generated model) discovered in a cave in Greece has been identified as the earliest modern human remains found outside Africa, putting the clock back on mankind’s arrival in Europe by more than 1,50,000 years. The remains are 16,000 years …

It will collect samples from beneath the surface of Ryugu as part of an effort to understand the origins of the solar system Japan’s Hayabusa2 probe made a “perfect” touchdown on Thursday on a distant asteroid, collecting samples from beneath the surface in an unprecedented mission that could shed light …

Centre says it will aid law enforcement The Automated Facial Recognition System (AFRS) will not violate privacy of citizens and is only being developed to help the law enforcement agencies to identify criminals, missing children and unidentified bodies in a scientific and speedy manner, a senior government official said on …

NHA teams up with Amazon to provide medical advice for common ailments Britain’s state-run health service is teaming up with Amazon to provide medical advice for common ailments such as migraines and flu via the tech giant’s voice assistant Alexa, aiming to help more patients at home and cut down …

It is currently undergoing integration The Indian Air Force is looking to adopt a new European visual range air to air missile across its fighter fleet. The Advanced Short Range Air-to-Air Missile of European missile-maker MBDA has been approved for fitting on Jaguar jets. The IAF was looking to integrating …

HoloLens, which blends digital imagery with real world, caters to firstline workers When Toby Bouska Jr. started assembling cabs for Kenworth semitrucks last year, he learned the ropes by observing longtime workers at the factory. But it wasn’t exactly engaging, and he didn’t get much practice doing the job himself. …

Aviation trails will take place after delivery, says Vice Admiral India-made Vikrant to be delivered by 2021 India’s first Indigenous Aircraft Carrier (IAC-I) Vikrant is at an advanced stage of construction and will be delivered in 2021, a senior Navy officer said on Monday. “Starting of gas turbines will take …

More than one billion young people risk damaging their hearing through excessive use of smartphones and other audio devices, the UN has warned, proposing new safety standards for safe volume levels. In a bid to safeguard hearing, the World Health Organization and International Telecommunications Union issued a non-binding international standard …

Forget dense forests. Even roadsides could be harbouring new species that are hard to find. Scientists from the University of Delhi have discovered a new amphibian — a mysterious narrow-mouthed frog, that makes only a four-day appearance in seasonal roadside puddles every year in Kerala’s Wayanad district — according to …

A new species of ‘crying’ snake has been discovered in Lepa-Rada district of Arunachal Pradesh. The discovery of the non-venomous crying keelback, whose zoological name is Hebius lacrima , has been published in Zootaxa , the New Zealand-based scientific mega-journal for animal taxonomy. “The name for this keelback was suggested …

Hydrothermarchaeota, or microbes living in extreme environments may hold clues to the evolution of early life. These microbes use carbon monoxide and sulfate as sources of energy – chemosynthesis. Published inThe ISME Journal, the study used genomic approaches to unravel the secrets of its survival. It may help predict about …

The abundance of 86 proteins were altered It is well known that TB bacteria can actively manipulate the degradative pathway of macrophages (cells responsible for detecting, engulfing and destroying pathogens) such that instead of getting destroyed, the TB bacteria can actually multiply inside the macrophages. Now, researches at the Institute …

By studying the faecal samples of over 100 healthy people from Madhya Pradesh and Kerala, researchers from the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research (IISER) Bhopal have decoded the Indian gut microbiome and have created a gene catalogue. Constructed using multiple omics approaches such as genomics and proteomics, the …