SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY AFFAIRS OCTOBER 2014
- Gangotri glacier rapidly disintegrating
The Gangotri glacier is rapidly disintegrating, states the latest observation of a team from the Almora-based G.B. Pant Institute of Himalayan Environment and Development. The team of the institute, which has been monitoring the Himalayan glaciers, particularly the Gangotri, since 1999, visited the glacier between June and October, this year.
A 2008 research report published in Current Science titled ‘Estimation of retreat rate of Gangotri glacier using rapid static and kinematic GPS survey,’ stated: ‘The Gangotri glacier is retreating like other glaciers in the Himalayas and its volume and size are shrinking as well.’
The glacier has retreated more than 1,500 metres (m) in the last 70 years. Post 1971, the rate of retreat of the glacier has declined. Dr Kumar said the latest data projects that post 2000 the average rate of retreat of the glacier per year has been about 12 to 13 m. Dr. Kumar said global warming was not the only factor, but, it was an important factor that was resulting in glacial retreat.
The Gangotri, one of the largest Himalayan glaciers, is in Uttarkashi district. Originating at about 7,100 m above sea level, the glacier is 30.2 kilometre (km) long and has a width that varies between 0.5 and 2.5 km. The Bhagirathi River, which is one of the main tributaries of the Ganga, originates from the glacier.
What is a glacier?
Glaciers are made up of fallen snow that, over many years, compresses into large, thickened ice masses. Glaciers form when snow remains in one location long enough to transform into ice. What makes glaciers unique is their ability to move. Due to sheer mass, glaciers flow like very slow rivers. Some glaciers are as small as football fields, while others grow to be dozens or even hundreds of kilometers long. Presently, glaciers occupy about 10 percent of the world's total land area - UNDP to aid energy efficiency programme
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) is implementing a project by which India's steel re-rolling mills can use advanced energy-efficient technologies called second generation (SG) technologies for energy conservation, according to Knowledge News Network, a media platform that focuses on the Indian micro, small and medium enterprise (MSME) sector.
The project is a part of the programme, 'Upscaling energy-efficient production in the small-scale steel industry in India', being implemented with support from Australian Aid and the Union ministry of steel. UNDP has identified five SG technologies in selected steel re-rolling mills in India for energy conservation and will support their adoption.
The five identified SG technologies are power generation through waste heat recovery from flue gas, effective furnace atmosphere control through automation, high-performing insulation for re-heating furnaces, coal drying using waste heat available in flue gas and energy efficiency in motion control.
UNDP is seeking details of suppliers that have ready products, technical know-how and adequate implementation experience in any of the five SG technologies.
India's secondary steel sector comprises some 1,800 small and medium-sized SRRMs. A typical SRRM comprises a re-heating furnace for heating ingots/billets and a rolling mill to give the ingots/billets the desired shape. Energy costs from 30-40 per cent of the conversion cost in a SRRM. - World’s first solar power plane to touch Ahmadabad, Varanasi
Ahmedabad and Varanasi are set for a flying start. The cities will be ports of stop in India for a unique experiment that began in Switzerland — around-the-world flight by the first aircraft run on solar power. In March next year, the Solar Impulse will fly into Ahmedabad from Abu Dhabi, where it begins its flight, and then halt at Varanasi before flying further towards the Pacific. - 7 new frog species reported from Western Ghats and Sri Lanka
A team of researchers from India and Sri Lanka has discovered seven new species of golden-backed frogs in the Western Ghats-Sri Lanka global biodiversity hotspot, throwing new light on the highly distinct and diverse fauna in the two countries.The frogs in Sri Lanka and those in India belong to distinctly different species. It was earlier believed that some of the golden-backed frogs (Genus Hylarana) found in the two countries were of the same species.
The team, led by Delhi University’s Prof. S.D. Biju, used DNA techniques and morphological evidence as tools to identify species and understand the frogs’ distribution.
The survey yielded 14 distinct golden-backed frogs, with seven new species, including one (Hylarana serendipi) from Sri Lanka. Of the six new species from the Western Ghats, four (H. doni, H.urbis, H.magna and H sreeni) are found in Kerala and one each in Karnataka (H. indica) and Maharashtra (H.caesari).
The study also indicates that frogs in the region are under threat due to habitat destruction. Interestingly, one of the newly-named species, Hylarana urbis, had remained unnoticed though its habitat is in urban areas in and around Kochi and is under threat due to human activity. - Scientists grow miniature human stomachs from stem cells
Scientists have grown miniature human stomachs from stem cells as a way of studying gastric diseases such as ulcers and stomach cancer and in the future creating tissue to repair patients’ stomachs.
The mini-stomachs are grown in petri dishes from stem cells. Fully formed, they are the size of a pea and shaped like a rugby ball. They are hollow with an interior lining that is folded into glands and pits like a real stomach. Crucially, the researchers found that the miniature stomachs, known as gastric organoids, respond to infection very much like ordinary human stomachs. - Green House Gas emissions need unprecedented cuts
The world is hurtling towards a climate crisis and will require unprecedented reduction in greenhouse gas emissions to keep average global temperature rise below 2 degree Celsius, compared to the pre-industrial era. Global emissions have already reached such a level that this tipping point could be avoided only with the deployment of silver bullet technologies that are yet uncertain. This is the summary of the UN climate change scientific panel's report which was formally agreed and adopted on 1st November by more than 190 countries at the end of the negotiations in Copenhagen.
The report, called 'Summary for Policy Makers of the Fifth Assessment Report Synthesis', of the UN Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is to be released on 2nd November. It is prepared after negotiations between climate scientists and representatives of more than 190 countries.
"Without additional mitigation efforts beyond those in place today, and even with adaptation, warming by the end of the 21st century will lead to high to very high risk of severe, widespread and irreversible impacts globally," warns the report.
Limiting the temperature rise to 2 degree Celsius has been accepted by the global community as the target it should try to achieve by reducing emissions under the new pact to be signed in 2015. The IPCC summary report will now act as the scientific basis on which the countries negotiate the new pact under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
The panel of scientists concluded that all projections of future global emissions that try to maintain global temperature rise below the dangerous 2 degree Celsius level require that the world undertake a 40-70% emission reduction by 2050 as compared to 2010 levels.
The report does not apportion responsibilities across countries for the climate change action but states that the principles of equity, justice and fairness of the global deal should be factored for a new global compact. It notes that the country’s most vulnerable to climate change have contributed little to it.
At current rate of emissions, the scientific panel reads, "Surface temperature is projected to rise over the 21st century under all assessed emission scenarios. It is very likely that heat waves will occur more often and last longer, and that extreme precipitation events will become more intense and frequent in many regions. The ocean will continue to warm and acidify, and global mean sea level will rise." - French scientists devise fast-track test for Ebola
A new device similar to a simple pregnancy home-test could allow doctors to diagnose a patient with suspected Ebola in less than 15 minutes, its French developers said on 21st October.
Trials at a high-security lab have validated the technique and prototype kits should be available in Ebola-hit countries by the end of October for a clinical trial, France's Atomic Energy Commission (CEA) said in a statement.
The diagnostic tool, not yet approved by regulators, works by monoclonal antibodies reacting to the presence of virus in a tiny sample which can be a drop of blood, plasma or urine it said. - Lowest temperature ever in universe recorded at Italian lab
Scientists at an Italian institute have set a world record of the lowest temperature ever achieved in the universe. They cooled a copper vessel with a volume of one cubic meter to -273.144 degrees Celsius. This is stunningly close to 'absolute zero', which is equal to -273.15 degrees Celsius. Theoretical physics says that temperature can never go below this limit.
No experiment on Earth has ever cooled a similar mass or volume to temperatures such a low; similar conditions are also not expected to arise in nature. This gives CUORE the distinction of being the coldest cubic meter in the known universe.The cooled copper mass, weighing approximately 400 kg, was the coldest cubic meter in the universe for over 15 days.
The experiment was carried out under the CUORE collaboration, located at the National Nuclear Physics Institute's Gran Sasso National Laboratory. Gran Sasso is the highest peak in the Apennines some 120 kilometers distant from Rome.
CUORE (which stands for Cryogenic Underground Observatory for Rare Events, but is also Italian for Heart) is an international collaboration involving some 130 scientists mainly from Italy, USA, China, Spain, and France. Its objective is to study the properties of neutrinos and search for rare processes.
The CUORE cryostat is the only one of its kind in the world, not only in terms of its dimensions, extreme temperatures, and cooling power, but also for the selected materials and for the building techniques that both guarantee very low levels of radioactivity. Absolute zero — considered the lowest possible temperature — is -273.15 degrees Celsius or zero on the Kelvin scale, named after 19th-century Irish engineer and physicist William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin, credited with establishing the correct value of the temperature. - In world first, ‘dead’ hearts transplanted into living patients
In a breakthrough, a team of doctors, including an Indian-origin surgeon, on 24th October said they have successfully performed the world's first heart transplant in Australia using a "dead heart", a major development that could save many lives.
The procedure, using hearts that had stopped beating, has been described as a "paradigm shift" that will herald a major increase in the pool of hearts available for transplantation. It is predicted the breakthrough will save the lives of 30 per cent more heart transplant patients. Until now, transplant units have relied solely on still-beating donor hearts from brain-dead patients.
However, the team at the lung transplant unit of St Vincent's Hospital here announced they had transplanted three heart failure patients using donor hearts that had stopped beating for 20 minutes. The first patient who received a heart Michelle Gribilas said she felt a decade younger and was now a "different person". Cardiothoracic surgeon Kumud Dhital, who performed the transplants with hearts donated after circulatory death (DCD), said he "kicked the air" when the first surgery was successful. - Scientists discover 'chink in HIV's armor'
Scientists have found a new protein, called Ssu72 that seems to be part of a switch used to awaken HIV-1 (the most common type of HIV) from its slumber. Scientists said that that the protein was not required for cell growth or division and hence if they would target Ssu72 interactions with the virus' protein, they may be able to stop the replication of HIV.
The team had begun by identifying a list of 50 or so proteins that interacted with a well-known protein HIV created called Tat. The findings had been surprising to the team because Tat, a relatively small protein, was previously thought to have a simpler role. Jones' lab had previously discovered the CycT1 protein, another critical protein that Tat used to begin the steps of replicating the virus and all these years, scientists thought that Tat only had this one partner (CycT1), but when looked at a bit harder, they had found that it also bound and stimulated the Ssu72 phosphatase, which controlled an immediately preceding step to switch on HIV.
CycT1 was needed for normal cell function, so it may not be an ideal anti-viral target. However, the team had found that Ssu72 was not required for making RNA for most host cell genes in the way it was used by HIV, making it a potentially promising target for drug therapy. Many proteins that Tat interacted with were essential for normal cellular transcription so those couldn't be targeted unless you want to kill normal cells and Ssu72 seemed to be different-at least in the way it is used by HIV. - ISRO notches another success with PSLV-C26
On October 15, 1994, India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-D2) for the first time successfully placed an Indian Remote-sensing Satellite into orbit. Twenty years later, on October 16, 2014, the PSLV-C26 lobbed the 1,425 kg Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS-1C) satellite into its precise orbit.
The latest mission was ISRO’s twenty-seventh consecutively successful PSLV flight. ISRO Chairman K. Radhakrishnan said, “The PSLV has done it again. IRNNSS-1C is up in orbit. ”
After a flight of 20 minutes and 18 seconds, the satellite was injected into an elliptical orbit. The IRNSS-1C is the third among seven navigation satellites, with a wide range of applications from helping truck drivers to submarines, missiles and battle tanks locate their positions. - Flight trial of Nirbhay successful
India's first indigenously designed and developed long range sub-sonic cruise missile 'Nirbhay' was successfully flight tested on 17th October from the Integrated Test Range (ITR), Balasore, Odisha. The entire mission, from lift-off till the final splash down was a perfect flight achieving all the mission objectives.
This was the second launch of 'Nirbhay' cruise missile. The maiden launch last year in March was a partial success achieving most of the mission objectives.
Shri P. Srikumar Director ADE, as the mission director led the launch operations. The launch preparations were planned and supervised by Shri VasanthSastri Project Director 'Nirbhay' project. The Defence Minister Shri Arun Jaitley has congratulated Dr AvinashChander and the DRDO team on the successful flight trial of 'Nirbhay'. - Land and ship variants of Nirbhay in 3 years
The land and ship versions of Nirbhay, the long-range subsonic cruise missile, would be developed within three years to give necessary bite to the armed forces, Scientific Advisor to Defence Minister and Director General Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO), Dr. Avinash Chander said. - GAGAN used for first time
For the first time, India’s GAGAN (GPS-Aided Geo Augmented Navigation) was used by the state-of-art Inertial Navigation System of the long-range subsonic cruise missile Nirbhay on 17th October. Besides ring laser gyroscope-based INS, the missile also had a redundant MEMS sensors based smart INS.
Sports: - Bryan brother’s triumph Shanghai Masters
American twins Bob and Mike Bryan won the Shanghai Masters men’s doubles title on 12th October to become the first pair to win all nine ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournaments.
The Bryan brothers defeated French Open champions Julien Benneteau and Edouard Roger-Vasselin 6-2, 7-6(3) to take an unprecedented 101st career title in their 152nd final.
The Masters 1000 events are the top ranking tournaments on the ATP Tour outside of the Grand Slams with the Bryans now boasting 31 of them after multiple wins in Indian Wells, Paris, Rome, Monte Carlo, Miami, Toronto, Madrid and Cincinnati. They also won the now defunct Hamburg Masters in 2007.
The victory in Shanghai Masters was their fifth Masters 1000 title of the season, a joint personal best, after they secured the year-end doubles No. 1 ranking earlier this week for the 10th time.
The duo have also won 16 Grand Slam titles together, a record for a pair, and in 2012 became only the second team to complete a Golden Slam after they won the London Olympics doubles title. - Indian Super League foot ball kicked off
The Indian Super League football got off to a cracker of a start as Atletico de Kolkata (ATK) blanked Mumbai City FC (MCFC) 3-0 in a well contested opener at the Salt Lake Stadium on 12th October. - Ajay won Dutch open
Indian shuttler Ajay Jayaram on 12th August notched up the biggest triumph of his career by clinching USD 50,000 Dutch Open Grand Prix badminton tournament in Almere, Netherlands. He defeated Indonesia’s Ihsan Maulana Mustofa in the men's singles final - Nirmla and Sunder win titles
S. Nirmala Devi defeated Kamini Boro’s challenge to clinch the individual women’s crown in the Indian (bamboo bow) round of the National archery championship at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium in New Delhi on 13th Octgober
M. Sunder Singh consistently shot top scores to beat his Assam Rifles teammate H. Bijendranath Singh 6-2 and take the men’s individual title. - West Indies pull out from ODI tour
West Indies cricket plunged into an unprecedented crisis following the decision of the team not to go ahead with the current tour of India. The team was to play the fifth ODI at Kolkata and a one-off T20 match at Cuttack followed by Tests at Hyderabad, Bangalore and Ahmedabad.
The decision was conveyed by the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB) after repeated negotiations with the team and the representatives of the Wavell Hinds-headed West Indies Players Association (WIPA) failed to solve the stalemate related to payment. - World’s first solar battery developed
American scientists have developed the world's first solar battery which recharges itself using air and light. Ohio State University reserachers developed the solar battery by combining a battery and a solar cell into one hybrid device.
Researchers said the key to the innovation is a mesh solar panel, which allows air to enter the battery, and a special process for transferring electrons between the solar panel and the battery electrode. Inside the device, light and oxygen enable different parts of the chemical reactions that charge the battery. The solar battery will be licensed to industry, where it will help tame the costs of renewable energy. - UN biodiversity meet warns of unmet targets
A UN conference on preserving the earth's dwindling resources opened on 6th October with grim warnings that the depletion of natural habitats and species was outpacing efforts to protect them. Just a week after conservation group WWF said wildlife numbers had halved in 40 years, governments met in South Korea to analyse progress since they agreed four years ago on 20 targets for stemming the tide of biodiversity loss.
Addressing the opening session of the Parties to the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD), the executive director of the UN Environment Programme Achim Steiner said a progress report to be published later Monday made for "very sobering" reading.
The Global Biodiversity Outlook report makes it clear that many of the so-called "Aichi Targets" -- which include halving habitat loss, reducing pollution and overfishing, and putting a brake on species extinction by 2020 -- would not be met.
The most recent update of the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of threatened species in July said a quarter of mammals, over a tenth of birds, and 41 percent of amphibians are at risk of extinction.
Last week, the WWF's 2014 Living Planet Report highlighted a 52 percent decline in mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish overall from 1970 to 2010.
It said humans were consuming resources at a rate that would require 1.5 Earths to sustain -- gobbling up animal, plant and other resources at a faster rate than nature can replenish them.
In a bid to arrest the decline, nations agreed on the 2011-2020 Aichi Targets at a meeting in Nagoya, Japan, in 2010. But they have struggled to find common ground on funding, especially for poor nations whose scarce resources are already committed elsewhere.
At the CBD's last meeting, in Hyderabad, India, in 2012, the world agreed to double biodiversity aid to developing countries by 2015. But they did not quantify either the base amount or the target -- and the numbers are still far from being resolved.
The meeting in Pyeongchang, which will host the 2018 Winter Olympics, will mark the entering into force of the Nagoya Protocol, which deals with the proprietary rights of traditional communities to the genetic data of species used by foreign scientists. - Indigenous microscope uses peacock feather technology
India on 7th October launched an ingeniously manufactured microscope that generates 3D images of objects. The Broad Spectrum Confocal Microscope has several applications in medicine and materials sciences. It uses an infra red beam which passes through a patented photonic crystal fiber made by the Central Glass and Ceramics Research Institute (CGCRI), Kolkata.
The microscope was developed by the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) along with Vinvish Technologies, Thiruvananthapuram, under the New Millennium Indian Technology Initiative, an effort launched by the CSIR over a decade ago to develop technologies through collaborative efforts by research laboratories and technology companies in India.
While similar confocal microscopes cost about Rs. 4 crore to import, these will be priced between Rs. 1.25 crore and Rs. 1.5 crore, said Suresh Nair of Vinvish Technologies.
Dr. Dasgupta said the complex fiber optics was a result of a decade of work which cost around Rs. 15 crore. In fact, it was these specialized applications of fiber optics that had made his centre’s work profitable, he said.
Minister of State for Science and Technology Jitendra Singh said, “This not only fulfils our goal of Make in India but it is also world class … A dream I cherish is to make the CSIR’s 38 labs into centers of excellence that would attract students from around the world. Scientists have also agreed to devote 12 hours every year to teaching in schools and colleges.” - Environment norms relaxed
The Centre has relaxed environment norms for industry in and around wildlife sanctuaries and national parks. To entertain states’ proposals to have no eco-sensitive zones around national parks and sanctuaries, the environment ministry has made it possible for project developers to begin work in these areas without a central nod. This was done through various guidelines issued in the last week of September.
In the case of industrial projects in wildlife areas, the ministry has said project proponents can carry out preliminary surveys after securing the approval of the forest officer (chief wildlife warden), instead of approaching the Centre, and, subsequently, seeking the nod of the National Board for Wildlife (NBWL).
The Centre has worked out this measure through a clause originally meant for scientific research, wildlife study, photography, tourism, etc. This will be now extended to industrial projects, on the condition that there is no physical disturbance to the protected area where the preliminary survey is conducted.
According to a Supreme Court mandate, projects within 10 km of a wildlife sanctuary or national park have to secure the approval of NBWL.
In another major step, the Centre has asked states to identify protected areas where there is no scope of demarcating eco-sensitive zones or where “zero” eco-sensitive zone is required. This is in line with demands of states such as Goa and Sikkim, which have said declaring eco-sensitive zones might impede socio-economic development in these state.
According to a Supreme Court ruling, state governments have to identify eco-sensitive areas around national parks and sanctuaries, where no development work is permitted. After the order, the Centre had directed states to identify such areas.
In a separate guideline, the Centre has asked states not to apply for NBWL clearances for projects near wildlife sanctuaries, as the environment ministry will decide which projects need NBWL nods. Currently, for projects near wildlife areas, state governments apply for an environment clearance and an NBWL clearance to the Centre.
The Centre noted a separate clearance from NBWL had been linked to the environmental clearance, under the Environment Protection Act, 1986. As of now, states assess whether projects fall within a 10-km radius of these wildlife zones and send a separate proposal to the Centre for review. The environment ministry has asked state governments not to do so any more.
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