Category: Science

Imagine you’re a detective looking for proof of something extraordinary. You find what looks like the perfect clue, a smoking gun that seems to prove your theory. But what if that clue could be explained by something more ordinary? Many physicists around the world are trying to create and identify special materials with unusual electronic…

Read More “Scientists urged to rethink ‘smoking gun’ signals in topological physics” »

Back to school | Photo Credit: Si-Gal A school bus approaches, and even from far away, its bright yellow coat catches your eye, gleaming in the sunlight. There’s a reason you rarely see school buses in red, blue, or green. And it’s all yellow In the VIBGYOR spectrum, yellow falls in the mid-to-long wavelength range…

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A new study has found that genes related to heart function, the nervous system, and the senses of vision and smell became overactive during spaceflight. Representative image of a NASA astronaut working outside the International Space Station. | Photo Credit: NASA As humans prepare for longer missions to the moon and eventually Mars, scientists need…

Read More “Scientists find spaceflight affects immune genes, deforms the brain” »

Group Captain Shubhanshu Shukla, right, with Group Captain Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair. File | Photo Credit: ANI Space is for everybody, and space is going to epitomise what deep tech is going to be, said Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair, Indian Air Force Group Captain who is one of the astronauts selected for India’s first crewed spaceflight mission, Gaganyaan.  He was speaking at the third edition of Deep Science Forum, a…

Read More “‘Rest of the world rooting for Gaganyaan mission,’ says Group Captain Prasanth Balakrishnan Nair” »

Why does the idea of eating insects provoke discomfort, even before taste or nutrition enters the conversation? At an edible insects stall during a food mela at the Science Gallery, Bengaluru, this question surfaced repeatedly as visitors negotiated curiosity, disgust and the boundaries of what they considered “normal” food. Many assumed they were encountering a…

Read More “What an edible insects stall revealed about acceptance, ‘normal’ food” »

(From left) Astronauts Jeremy Hansen, Victor Glover, Reid Wiseman, and Christina Koch greet the crowd at Ellington Field near NASA’s Johnson Space Centre, April 3, 2023. | Photo Credit: NASA A: Artemis II is the first crewed mission of NASA’s Artemis programme. It will be the first time humans will travel to the vicinity of…

Read More “What is the NASA Artemis II mission?” »

Many think the idea of ‘dumping’ in global trade is a red herring. The reason is obvious: if country A is able to dump certain goods in country B, it’s not because A has smuggled them in. It’s because someone in country B was interested in receiving those goods, and B’s laws allowed for them…

Read More “If data is the new oil, what does that make data centres?” »

Scientists at a nuclear fusion reactor in China recently surmounted an important obstacle in operating reactor vessels at high density. They pushed plasma density 65% beyond a special threshold, entering a stable state that overcomes a long-standing barrier to achieving burning plasma, the stage where a fusion reaction becomes self-sustaining. Fusion power mimics what happens…

Read More “China’s EAST fusion reactor beats density limit, widens path to power” »